


catch me if you can!

by legendaryguitarman



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Online Dating, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-18
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-10-29 03:48:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 29,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10845861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/legendaryguitarman/pseuds/legendaryguitarman
Summary: There are two very simple solutions to all of Baekhyun’s problems: the five inch dildo stuffed in his top drawer, which can vibrate in three different settings, and the internet. Unfortunately, as Baekhyun finds out, neither of them are particularly good ideas at three in the morning.





	1. Chapter 1

**BAEK DOCUMENTARY[#6](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%236): THE BOYFRIEND**  
[301 views]  
Published 2 hours ago  
baekhyunee_gg [Subscribed]  
  
Hope you guys like this quick video! Never gonna try this again…scary! >_<   
  
  
_“Hey guys! Welcome to the sixth episode of the long-awaited series, Baek Documentary! Today we’re going to film the Boyfriend—_ get your fat ass out of my face, Chanyeol— _and…uh, yeah. That’s it, really. Let’s hope I’m still alive by the end of this video!  
  
Oh, and guys! By the way_—like, seriously, move, Chanyeol! Don’t you have better things to do, like slap your balls on Zitao’s ass? What, he’s mad at you? You want me to talk to him? Okay, whatever, I’ll do it later, just— _sorry about that. Annoying roommate. Wait, what was I talking about before—oh yeah. I remember now. PSA: to the people who keep shipping us together, Chanyeol is not my boyfriend! He is_ really _not my boyfriend. I wouldn’t date him even if you paid me. Well, maybe if you paid me. But we’re getting off-topic. Back to our quest to find the Boyfriend. This elusive creature should be—a-ha! Found him. Living in the undergrowth of his natural habitat, the lounge_ —yes, Chanyeol, I know there is no undergrowth in our living room. It’s figurative. It’s figurative undergrowth, Chanyeol!— _ahem. Excuse me. The Boyfriend is currently conducting his daily life. Right now, he seems subdued enough to approach with relative ease, but we must be careful about this. The Boyfriend is prone to psychotic episodes and we must—“  
  
“Baekhyun, what are you doing?”  
  
“Oh—oh, hey, Soo! Haha, I didn’t see you there! What’s up? Have I told you that you’re looking particularly ravishingly beautiful—not that you don’t usually—and should not take this spontaneous compliment as anything suspicious on my part?”  
  
“I’m reading a book. What else does it look like, you moron—wait. Are you—are you filming right now?”  
  
“What? Of course not! Of course I’m not filming! I—holy fuck, put down that book, Soo! Put the book down! It’s hardback—PUT THE BOOK DOWN, KYUNGSOO.”  
  
“You’re fucking dead, Byun.”  
  
“OKAY GUYS, THAT’S ALL FOR THIS WEEK, SEE YOU NEXT TIME IF I’M STILL ALIVE, KISS KISS HEARTEU HEARTEU LOVE YOU GUYS MWAH OKAY SOO PLEASE PUT THE BOOK DOWN—“_  
  
The video rolls to a stop as the screen blacks out and Sehun, grinning triumphantly, looks over his shoulder to face Jongin, who is sitting on the bed and pretending to listen lest he suffer another unfortunate projectile-sock-in-the-face incident.  
  
“See?” Sehun says smugly, jabbing his thumb at the computer where he’s logged into his Youtube account, iloveyoumirandakerrnoona. “I told you they’re perfect for each other. My intuition is never wrong. I’m, like, the relationship god.”  
  
“Uh, yeah, because Kyungsoo possibly maiming Baekhyun equals a normal, functional relationship?”  
  
“I didn’t say it was a _healthy_ relationship,” Sehun answers. “Anyway, that’s just how Kyungsoo shows affection. He probably wasn’t hugged enough as a child.” He closes the window on the screen and switches off his computer, spinning around fully in his desk chair to Jongin’s direction. He taps his chin thoughtfully. “I think they’re good for each other. Kyungsoo’s so uptight and shy that he needs someone to bring him out of his shell, and Baekhyun needs someone to mellow him out because he’s like a tiny hamster on a sugar rush. Ergo, they are perfect for each other—no, shut up, Jongin, don’t ruin this for me.”  
  
Jongin just shrugs. “Okay, fine, whatever. You’re so dead if Baekhyun finds out though.”  
  
“As opposed to being slightly dead?” says Sehun, and Jongin rolls his eyes. “Besides, so are you. Guilty by association.”  
  
“Dammit,” says Jongin. “I guess that means we hafta make the time we’ve got alive worthwhile, huh?”  
  
The edge of Jongin’s lips has curled up into that sort of crooked, wolfish smirk that Sehun finds so attractive, and ever so slightly, that Sehun would’ve missed it if he weren’t so in tune with Jongin’s body, the sleepy droop of Jongin’s eyes suddenly wakes up. The beginning of a red-hot heat stirs in Sehun’s gut and Jongin’s tongue, teasingly peeking out of his mouth to lick at his lips, tell him that Jongin is thinking about the exact same thing.  
  
“Yeah,” says Sehun, advancing towards Jongin. “I’ll make it worth your while.”  
  
Approximately two hundred miles away, Kyungsoo sneezes and feels mildly traumatised. He also feels the sudden urge to insist that in reality, he was hugged many times during his childhood and is actually an avid cuddler, thank you very much.  
  
“Bless you,” Baekhyun murmurs into his hair.  
  
“Thanks,” says Kyungsoo.  
  
Baekhyun squeezes his hand where their fingers are laced together and an inexplicable warmth bursts in Kyungsoo’s chest, something that makes him shiver because the sensation is new and oddly familiar at the same time, like happening upon an old friend for a long time. Not that he’ll ever admit it, of course, because he prides himself in eschewing all physical contact and Baekhyun is pretty much a living booger, but as he looks at Baekhyun and Baekhyun grins back at him in that stupid, dopey way of his, he supposes that he can let it pass, just this once.  
  
(And the million other times Baekhyun had held his hand. Not that he’ll ever admit to that either.)

◄◄

  
  
  
  
To say that Twinkerella is having a bad day would be an understatement. Working at Didwey Worl, the giant amusement park in the north of the city which faces plagiarism and copyright issues on a daily basis, is every small child’s dream, but it is her worst nightmare. On a scale of one to ten, her day would be ranging around the twenty-million area—utterly _horrible,_ complete with the hyperbolic adjective and italicisation. Running off two hours of sleep in the hot, yellow sun, raining torrential sunbeam piss on her, means she is ridiculously cranky this morning, having made two kids cry already, and she’s barely in any mood to put up with her friends’ shit today.  
  
She’s convinced that they seriously don’t have anything better to do than annoy her at work. Chanyeol, more often than not, is the main culprit: whenever things go wrong, she swears it’s his idea because Jongdae is 0.3cm shorter than her (which is, like, six miles in short people terms) and therefore he is invalid and is not worthy to bask in her presence, and Zitao doesn’t particularly care unless it involves shopping. As such, Chanyeol always gets the brunt of her temper and rightly so; even though he’s significantly taller and has the upper body strength she lacks, she has street-smarts and has been trained in hapkido since she was, like, her dad’s sperm cell.  
  
“Oh my gosh! Such filthy, coarse language coming from a pwincess! I am horrified, Baekhyun,” Chanyeol says like the asshole he is.  
  
“Shut it, Yoda,” snarls Baekhyun as he hitches up his dress as elegantly as one can when one is a moody college boy entering their emo phase ten years too late, flashing his panties at a small child who is consequently traumatised for the rest of his life. This dress is inhumanely stuffy—he’s usually Twinkerbell, but Minseok, who plays Twinkerella, is off sick today and Baekhyun, being the philanthropic sexy main protagonist who gets all the ladies he is, had offered to fill in for him. Terrible, terrible idea, he realises in retrospect, because having to wear puffed sleeves, no matter how empowered they make him feel, is totally not worth picking up an extra shift of work.  
  
And—oh great. Another insufferable bag of cells coming to annoy him, he thinks, as Jongin waddles towards them from his own station, dressed as Narcoleptic Beauty in his pink dress and golden wig. He’s probably on his lunch break or a suicide mission as he shoves heart disease and high blood pressure in the form of a McDonald’s cheesyveggiefrieschickenbulgogifish burger into his mouth.  
  
“You sound angry, hyung,” he says through a mouthful of food, with all the tact of the gastrointestinal tract through which one might expel excrement and farts. Baekhyun is jealous. Jongin’s dress is floaty? and swishy? and doesn’t chafe his dick? He does not deserve to have his dick unchafed. “You look like death.”  
  
“Jongin, this is a life lesson for you,” says Chanyeol. “This is what happens when you stay up all night watching porn.”  
  
“Excuse me,” Baekhyun answers flippantly, “I’m not you.”  
  
Chanyeol splutters as Zitao suddenly gives him a sharp look, holding his hands up in defence. Zitao pretends to be a good, slightly possessive boyfriend, but Baekhyun knows this is like some kind of strange, exhibitionist BDSM-kinky foreplay between the two of them. “I would never—Zitao, don’t listen to him, he’s hopped on 240p assholes and slippery dicks!”  
  
“Oh,” says Jongin. “So that’s what those weird noises coming from your room yesterday night were.”  
  
A little girl comes trundling along in mouse ears and a blue sparkly dress that matches Baekhyun’s own, except it’s tacky and five sizes too small. “Go away, you’re not supposed to be in this scene, you’re an expendable side character,” Baekhyun hisses, and one look at Baekhyun’s face makes her cry in fear, running into a trash can. Baekhyun is so good with kids. He just knows he’s going to make a great mother some day.  
  
“What was it this time?” Jongdae asks, grinning wickedly. His built-in This Person is Uncomfortable and I am Going to Exploit It for My Own Personal Entertainment radar is screaming right now. “Feet? Old women”— _MATURE,_ coughs Chanyeol. Zitao hits him and Baekhyun decides that as of this moment, Zitao is his new best friend—“cola bottles? Gross fanmade Naruto yaoi?”  
  
An indignant squeak comes from Jongin as he sprays out flecks of his cheesyveggiefrieschickenbulgogifish burger, his face turning red. Baekhyun cannot decide whether he wants to be impressed or grossed out. He settles for sexy aloof indifference. “Sasuke and Naruto are meant to be together! It’s the underlying homosexual context that makes their love so bomb-diggity! You will never know love or friendship and I feel sorry for you!” Jongin clears his throat. “Not that…not that anyone asked. Just. Putting it out there.”  
  
“Riiiiight,” Baekhyun says. “And FYI, I was not watching porn. I was simply admiring someone from afar. And by afar, I mean, like, literally afar. Like, three-cities-away-through-my-laptop afar.”  
  
“So, porn,” Jongdae says.  
  
“Not porn,” says Baekhyun. “I found him. The love of my life. The apple of my eye. My one and only.”  
  
“So, porn,” Jongdae says.  
  
Baekhyun lets out an exasperated sigh. Jongdae is infuriating.  
  
“NOT PORN,” says Baekhyun. “I am a pure and innocent child.” (A lie. He had lost his purity at the age of thirteen when Baekbeom had shown him the dark, seedy underworld of the internet.) “I do not indulge myself in such disgusting activities, such as watching low quality pornography.” (Another lie. It is now a recreational sport he enjoys. A little bit too much.) “Someone posted a link on one of my videos to another YT singer, xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx. Upon my mission to scope out the competition I have discovered that he is epitome of humankind. His voice is, like, WOW. The emotion from his voice when he sings penetrates my spiritual orifices. I want to bang his voice. Is it possible to be sexually attracted to a voice?”  
  
“Yes,” Zitao says at the same time Chanyeol says, “No.”  
  
“I get it now,” Jongdae says. “So, _gay_ porn?”  
  
“I will stab your eyeball with Jongin’s tiara and shove my fist into the empty socket, Jongdae,” Baekhyun says pleasantly, indirectly scarring another small child who seeks sanctuary between his mother’s boobs. It’s funny because Jongdae laughs like he’s joking, but he really isn’t.  
  
“That wasn’t a no.”  
  
“NOT GAY PORN.”  
  
He’s not lying; he really hadn’t watched gay porn, but here’s the embarrassing part:  
  
He’s a hot, single college student with a healthy bowel movement (all hail high-fibre wholegrain cereal!) and the wrong priorities in life, and the problem with being a hot, single college student with a healthy bowel movement and the wrong priorities in life is the insane boredom that comes along with it. Inevitably, with insane boredom comes an insatiable libido. He’s not saying he sleeps around because he has standards (he is not Zitao), but his Google Chrome history is something he would never show his mother, and there’s a reason why is laptop password is somewhere between eight and sixteen characters long and includes special symbols, capital letters and numbers. Suffice to say, he’s sat through more hours of shoving his fingers into Unmentionable Places than he’s proud to admit and he’s closer with his own right hand than his best friend, and isn’t that just a little bit sad?  
  
However! He digresses.  
  
He’s come a long way from stubbing his toes on stray Nokia 5110s and tripping over all the ribbons from Jongin’s Sailor Senshi outfits he leaves on the floor because he’s an incompetent plebe. Over the years, Baekhyun has done a lot of growing up. He is mature, like the cheese in the back of his fridge, and has the knowledge of a man who has meditated in the Himalaya Mountains for sixty years through watching the Discovery Channel and butchering Wikipedia articles. Being the wise, horny modern Jesus Christ he is, he has discovered two simple solutions to his problems: the five inch dildo which can vibrate in three different settings stuffed in his top drawer, and the internet.  
  
Unfortunately, as he’d found out yesterday, neither of them are particularly good ideas at three in the morning.  
  
“You stayed up all night watching some guy’s Youtube videos? La-me,” Chanyeol laughs. “And jerked off to his voice too? Mega lame.”  
  
“I didn’t jerk off!” says Baekhyun. “I just. Expressed my appreciation in an unconventional way because I am unconventional like that. I do not conform to society’s rules. Shut up. Our love is real!”  
  
What Baekhyun does not tell them is that there is a fine line between having a healthy appreciation for a moderately famous internet singer and having an obsessive crying-into-his-cup-ramen fixation for a moderately famous internet singer and he’d crossed that line around the fifth repeat of all thirty-four videos on xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx’s channel last night.  
  
He’d finally mustered up the courage to send a message to the guy—or girl with an oddly deep voice; he is all for gender equality—through the Youtube messaging system after he’d followed xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx’s Official Twitter Account for Fans Only and xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx had followed Baekhyun back. Their conversation had gone something like this. It was rife with sexual tension. Baekhyun had discovered, that night, just how sexually tense the Arial font is.  
  
  
 **baekhyunee_gg**  
Hi! I’m Baekhyun! I just wanted to say that I’m a really big fan of your singing! :)  
  
 **xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx**  
Thanks i guess  
Does your mom know youre on youtube  
  
  
Baekhyun had promptly regurgitated his noodles and baby-birded it onto his puppy sleeping on his lap.  
  
  
 **baekhyunee_gg**  
I’m in college…  
  
 **xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx**  
Oh right sorry my bad  
  
  
Something in his unpunctuated, size 10.5 typing had told Baekhyun he wasn’t sorry at all. But that is okay! Baekhyun has used his powers of extreme contextual deduction to infer that xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx wants to cuddle him whilst watching reruns of _Korea’s Next Top Model_ and share a massive bowl of beef ramen, Lady and the Tramp style. It is only a matter of time before xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx falls for his charming charms and handsomely handsome good looks.  
  
“What an emotionally-penetrative _conversation,_ ” says Jongdae. Baekhyun hates how Jongdae makes everything sound sexual by putting emphasis in weird places. Actually, Baekhyun just hates Jongdae. “Is he hot? I’d get it if he were hot.”  
  
“Our love is deeper than just looks and appearances!”  
  
“Meaning you don’t know what he looks like.”  
  
Baekhyun glares at him and stomps his feet like the calm, cherry-blossom-tree-on-the-hillside-swaying-peacefully-in-the-cool-breeze adult he is. xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx is an anonymous singer; his videos usually feature a simple title screen, sometimes with lyrics, and it just makes him much more mysterious and sexy. “That is what makes our love so special!” Baekhyun says. “I don’t need to know what he looks like to know he’s the pinnacle of sexiness. If sex were an animate object that had vocal cords, it would sound like him. His voice is like dark chocolate after the one minute beep of the microwave. I bet he’s—“  
  
“—a short, ugly, unshaven, smelly eighty year old chain-smoking fat man, baiting young children on the internet with his candyvan singing—”  
  
“—TALL AND HANDSOME, LIKE A HOLLISTER MODEL, WITH NICELY GROOMED EYEBROWS AND PUSHED-BACK BLONDE HAIR LIKE A SWOOSHING GLOSSY WATERFALL OF CHEETO DUST AND GLISTENING ABS THAT GLISTEN ABDOMINALLY IN THE SUNLIGHT, AND HE’S PROBABLY MYSTERIOUS AND COLD ON THE OUTSIDE BUT IS A TOTAL DORK ON THE INSIDE WHO ENJOYS KNITTING OR SOMETHING,” Baekhyun finishes in one breath.  
  
“Wow,” says Jongdae. “I think you just described 2013 Jongin.”  
  
Letting out a frustrated noise, Baekhyun turns to Jongin for help. Jongin has been listening to the whole exchange with his mouth gaping open, still stuffed with burger, and he looks at Baekhyun strangely, which is not unusual because Baekhyun is not entirely sure Jongin is from this planet. It is not humanely possible to love bad mainstream shoujo anime as much as Jongin loves bad mainstream shoujo anime.  
  
“Uh, hyung, did you say ‘xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx’?” he asks, looking faintly repulsed.  
  
“Yeah,” Baekhyun says. “You know him?”  
  
“He’s Sehun’s roommate,” Jongin says as if he doesn’t really want to but has to because it’s necessary for plot development. “Kyungsoo.”  
  
Baekhyun’s world spins around him like the 360˚ cam in a bad pop music video and skids to a stop as he stares at Jongin, slack-jawed. Jongin, his socially-inept amoebic roommate, knows a boy with an incredibly sexy voice? Has known him for, like, two years? Baekhyun feels…offended that Jongin’s first priority wasn’t to introduce them. Isn’t that everyone’s first priority? To introduce Baekhyun to hot single boys?  
  
And he also feels…slightly homicidal.  
  
Jongin doesn’t jump out of the way fast enough when Baekhyun lunges for his neck with both hands, his dress billowing in the tailwind. Fortunately, Chanyeol is a good human shield and Baekhyun crashes head-first into Chanyeol’s unreasonably firm pectorals. Jongin looks terrified behind him and Zitao doesn’t care, internet shopping for pleather cock rings on his phone because he’s basic like that. Over by the side, Jongdae is laughing so hard he’s leaning over the trash can in case he pukes. He has asthma so Baekhyun takes a few seconds out of being in his violent rage to hope Jongdae doesn’t have his inhaler. The only person who is (sometimes) a good friend is Chanyeol, who’s patting Baekhyun’s head and trying his best not to laugh. Baekhyun takes a few deep breaths to calm himself down until he is once again a calm cherry blossom tree swaying calmly in the calm breeze, and sends Jongin a forced smile.  
  
“Jongin,” he says, “if you value your life, you will give me Kyungsoo’s Skype. Or phone number. Or Facebook. Or any means of social contact. Do not stand in the way of our love.”  
  
“No,” says Jongin.  
  
Baekhyun did not want it to come to this, but if Jongin will not co-operate, Baekhyun will have to pull out the big guns. “Jongin,” he says, “if you value your collector’s edition of _Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica_ Fully Articulated Figurines (Costume Version, Set B), you will give me Kyungsoo’s contact information. This is your last warning.”  
  
Jongin clasps his hand over his mouth in horror. The burger drops to the floor in slow-motion with a thud, and Chanyeol hurriedly picks it up, saying something about ten second rules. “You wouldn’t,” Jongin whispers.  
  
“I know where you keep them, Jongin,” says Baekhyun quietly.  
  
Baekhyun knows he is not a particularly nice person. He’s the kind of guy who says he’ll count to one hundred during hide and seek, but only counts to fifty and peeks through the gaps of his medically recognised gappy fingers, the kind of guy who steals ketchup packets from Burger King and sells them for profit on eBay. It is only natural that he is not above using any means possible to achieve his goals. Being friends with these idiots for so long has allowed him to accumulate a large database of blackmail information. For example, he knows Jongdae drinks his coffee with four teaspoons of sugar and about twenty gallons of cream. What a pussy. He knows that Zitao has a pair of neon-yellow fluorescent Crocs in the back of his closet and Chanyeol writes 2NE1 fanfiction under the username ‘sandaraparkblackjackfanlove2ne1forever.’ Jongin is a little bit more secretive, but he has not evaded Baekhyun’s ninja detective skills. Jongin’s weakness is his anime figurines. Baekhyun intends to exploit this fact to his advantage.  
  
“I just,” Jongin whimpers, “I just don’t want to jeopardise my relationship with Sehun just so you can bang his roommate and then never speak to him again. Sehun is the first boyfriend I’ve ever had who is actually. You know. 3D. And doesn’t have a censored penis. Don’t take this away from me.”  
  
The battle is won. Baekhyun grins smugly. Jongin is caving. “I have NEVER done that,” Baekhyun says reassuringly. “I would NEVER do that to Sehun’s roommate, Jongin. I LOVE Sehun, Jongin. Platonically. I would NEVER do anything to intentionally hurt you or him. NEVER.”  
  
Jongdae grabs a cup of blueberry flavoured slushie out of a poor child’s hands, just so he can snort it out of his nose in what Baekhyun presumes is laughter but actually sounds like a dying whale’s mating call. Attractiveness has never been one of Jongdae’s strong points.  
  
“Okay, fine. But it was one time! That guy was into some really kinky stuff and I wanted to end it before things got serious,” Baekhyun says.  
  
Zitao coughs a cough that sounds suspiciously like ‘jar porn.’ Baekhyun thinks he needs to find new friends.  
  
Jongin still looks unsure. “I just…”  
  
“Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaase.”  
  
“Fine,” Jongin says in defeat. “I’m not promising anything, but I’ll ask Sehun about it.”  
  
It is a small victory. Nonetheless, it is still a victory. Baekhyun’ll take it. He fist-pumps so excitedly that he almost smacks Chanyeol on the nose, but he’s too excited to care.  
  
  
  


♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
As soon as he arrives home into the comfort of the warm embrace of his Wi-Fi connection, Chanyeol, codename Annoying Roommate No. 1, makes some excuse about ‘homework stuff’ he has to do and makes a beeline for his bedroom. It doesn’t escape Baekhyun that Chanyeol double-locks the door, which Baekhyun is glad about because he doesn’t really want to know what Chanyeol does in there, although he has a hunch it isn’t homework. Sometimes, he hears screaming. But. Like. Sexual screaming. Like, biology-defying-man-giving-birth-to-quadruplets-screaming. Why is everyone so sexual today????  
  
It’s probably compensation for Jongin, codename Annoying Roommate No. 2. He shares a bedroom with Baekhyun and so Baekhyun knows for a fact that Jongin had been a virgin until he met Sehun. Which is, like, whatever, because Baekhyun doesn’t really care about Jongin’s virginity, but it means he acts like a nineteenth century nun and covers his eyes when Baekhyun changes to the Discovery Channel. It’s sort of pathetic, to be honest; then again, Jongin watches Cardcaptor Sakura religiously and his half of the bedroom is decorated with Yu-Gi-Oh cards and Gundam toys. Thinking about it, Baekhyun is not really surprised. It could be worse, he supposes. Annoying Roommate No. 2 could be Jongdae.  
  
After Chanyeol runs off to have nasty phone sex with his boyfriend, Jongin heads straight to the bathroom to find their pet dog, a poodle-Pomeranian crossbreed, Park-Kim-Byun-Uchiha Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior. Their apartment complex has a strict no-pet policy, but Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior doesn’t really do much apart from stare at his own reflection in the mirror. At first, it had been cute; they’d thought that maybe Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior had thought it was a friend or something, but now Baekhyun is certain that their puppy is psychiatrically narcissistic.  
  
“Aren’t you such a cutie pie?” Jongin says, bringing Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior, who refuses to answer to anything other than his full title, into the lounge. “Never forget how special you are. You were named after the seven greatest men”—Baekhyun clears his sinuses loudly. He’s rather phlegmatic during the spring. It’s the only flaw in his otherwise perfect existence—“uh, sorry. Five greatest men and two greatest women. In the world.”  
  
Whilst Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior is the most adorable dog ever with his characteristically thick dogbrows, Jongin nuzzling his wet puppy nose is physically revolting. Shoving them both into the kitchen, Baekhyun dumps caviar and a slab of raw beefsteak into Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’s bowl and corners Jongin against the sink, making sure he stands on his tiptoes so he can breathe right onto Jongin’s neck and make him feel uncomfortable. Jongin looks so scared. Oh, joy. Baekhyun lives off the fear of others. It’s how he maintains his perfect figure and honey thighs.  
  
“Sehun. Kyungsoo. Text. Now,” he says in his best Oh My, Is That the Smell of Burning Anime Figurines? voice.  
  
“Okay, okay, I’m texting him right now,” says Jongin, tapping quickly on his phone. He holds his screen up to Baekhyun where the wallpaper of his chatroom with Sehun, a picture of Sehun in a maid’s dress Baekhyun really wishes he hadn’t seen, is covered in a plethora of heart emoticons and kissy-face stickers.  
  
The reply comes instantly to Baekhyun’s phone. Baekhyun has always liked Sehun. Not because he’s a good match for Jongin or any gross romantic shit like that (Sehun can do so much better) but because he is the only person who is not completely useless. Also, Baekhyun feels like they are kindred spirits. Though they aren’t particularly close, he’s always felt a kind of kinship with Sehun that only delighting in the misfortune of others and a deep love for home manicures can bring.  
  
  
 **se_ehun**  
Jongin says ur interested in my roommate ;)  
  
 **baekhyun**  
yea  
  
 **se_ehun**  
He also said something about banging?? And then not banging??? And????? Whatever idk what he’s talking about most of the time anyway  
  
 **baekhyun**  
smh jongin havent your animes taught u better than to standing in the way of TRUE LOVE????  
  
 **se_ehun**  
Is he looking at ur screen rn  
Jongin go away adults are talking go play with your polly pockets like a good boy  
Maybe ill reward you later  
  
  
Jongin sniffles and takes Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior with to the bedroom, muttering something about how they aren’t Polly Pockets; actually, they’re collectible PVC figurines, only to be looked at and loved from afar and never to be played with, and it is a respectable, recognised hobby which even adults can enjoy. However, now that Baekhyun’s alone, he messages Sehun to call him so they can talk about banging Kyungsoo like the responsible cherry blossom tree adults they are.  
  
“’Sup,” Sehun answers monotonously. He’s probably sold his facial expressions on the black market in exchange for perpetually flawless hair. The little shithead doesn’t even use formal language anymore, which is either an indication of their deep friendship or intense disrespect. Knowing Sehun, it is neither because he is incapable of human emotion.  
  
“Stop acting like a 1990s Backstreet Boy and tell me how to slip ‘n slide my way into Kyungsoo’s pants!!!!”  
  
Baekhyun can practically hear Sehun rolling his eyes. No, like, literally. _Squick. Squelch._ Sehun has mucosal eyes, but it’s a sensitive topic for him so Baekhyun doesn’t bring it up.  
  
“I’ll message you his personal Twitter account. I don’t think he’d appreciate me giving you his Skype directly, so you’ll have to work for it. Romance isn’t dead! Hooray!” Sehun says, absolutely devoid of any happiness. Even his exclamation marks, at best, sound like full stops. He pauses. “I should warn you, though. Kyungsoo-hyung’s a bit…um, how do I put this without hurting his feelings…oh wait, he doesn’t have feelings. He’s a douchebag. He says he is unbreachable like the Sina Wall? Whatever that means. So yeah. Talk to him. At first, he’ll seem like a douchebag, and after he warms up to you, he’ll seem less like a douchebag.”  
  
“Can’t you just send me a picture of him so I can masturba—I MEAN, USE FOR SCIENTIFIC PURPOSES?”  
  
“He’s allergic to photographs,” says Sehun. “He doesn’t even take selfies. I think he’s secretly a vampire or something—oh hey, hyung.”  
  
Baekhyun’s heart stops. Sehun’s phone must be on loudspeaker because Baekhyun can hear Kyungsoo’s panty-dropping voice through the phone as he asks, “Sehun, what do you want for dinner?”  
  
Holy shit. _Holy shit. Hoooooooly shit._ Somehow, Kyungsoo sounds even better through the crappy, static-y connection of the phone. There’s a certain rawness to it that makes Baekhyun’s chest squeeze; Kyungsoo’s voice has a slightly husky, deep tone, and it’s so smooth and enticing. If Baekhyun had ovaries, he’s sure they would’ve exploded by now. After a moment of thought, he pulls at the waistband of his panties and checks inside just in case. Phew. No accident. Yet. Kyungsoo’s voice is so lovely, so soft it makes Baekhyun hard. Baekhyun doesn’t think he’s popped a boner from listening to someone talk about dinner before, but there’s a first time for everything. Baekhyun wants to take Kyungsoo’s voice and wrap himself in it like a warm, fuzzy voice burrito and roll around in clouds of Youtube videos and sexy indie song covers.  
  
“Can’t we just order takeout, hyung? Buing buing,” Baekhyun hears Sehun saying with thinly veiled disgust at his own aegyo. No!!! Sehun!!!!! What are you doing?? The Epitome of Humankind, the Pinnacle of Sexiness, is offering to cook you dinner and you are refusing!!!!! YOU ARE SUCH A DISAPPOINTMENT!!! SHAME ON YOUR PERFECTLY COIFFED HAIR!!!  
  
A sigh escapes from Kyungsoo’s lips. Baekhyun can just see Kyungsoo’s lips in his mind, a sexy amorphous blob with gorgeous lips. They would be perfect. Plump, pink and plush, thick enough so Baekhyun would be able to kiss them and they’d look so hot all red and swollen, and they’d look amazing around his dick. Oh god, he would have cocksucking lips. Baekhyun isn’t sure how he feels about that, but his dick does.  
  
“We had takeout yesterday,” Kyungsoo says. “Ah, whatever. You’ll eat whatever I make anyway.”  
  
There’s the click of the door shutting and Sehun’s voice crackles through again, directed at Baekhyun this time. “Hey, are you still there? Or have you jizzed so hard you’ve passed out from dehydration?”  
  
“I have to go,” Baekhyun croaks, pressing the ‘end call’ button and sliding down the kitchen counter, clutching his phone to his chest. His precious Kyungsoo. He’d heard his precious Kyungsoo talk. It’s only been one day and he is already madly in love. Kyungsoo’s voice is a tiny slice of heaven. Kyungsoo’s voice is the cool breeze that makes his cherry blossom tree sway peacefully. Also his dick is hard? He should probably take care of that before anyone notices and holds it against him for the rest of his life.  
  
He inhales deeply to calm his racing heart and steadily lifts himself up on both legs, staring straight at Jongin who’d been watching from the doorway of his room. Jongin stares back at him, face crimson, and then turns around, mumbling, “I don’t even want to know,” as he places his hands over Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’s ears.  
  
Considering the general consensus is that all of Baekhyun’s friends are thoroughly fucked buttholes, Sehun is unexpectedly reliable. After Baekhyun returns from a quick shower to definitely not jerk off or anything, his phone is flashing with twenty two new messages. Twenty one of them are from Sehun; there’s one with Kyungsoo’s Twitter handle, nineteen good luck emojis, and one that says, _Jongdae hyung told me about ur gay porn fantasies about kyungsoo hyung. I didn’t know u were into testicular castration kekeke._ Fucker probably didn’t even quirk a smile at that _kekeke._ The final message is from Jongdae, which simply reads, _bitch tell chanyeol to stop fingering himself to zitaos ugly selcas and come over to help me finish the boss level on ocarina of time._ Baekhyun shoots a message of gratitude to Sehun, sends _no. i hope you die you fuckburger._ to Jongdae, and quickly logs onto his personal Twitter account to follow Kyungsoo.  
  
To his disappointment, Kyungsoo does not have a picture of himself as his icon. He doesn’t even have an icon. He’s a purple egg. For a second, Baekhyun wonders if Kyungsoo is hideously ugly, but then he remembers that even Chanyeol takes selfies so it must be something else and he gets over it pretty quickly. He likes a man who doesn’t conform to social pressure about having a nice icon. Clicking the ‘follow’ button, he waits an eternity of four minutes before the ‘pending’ flips to a ‘following’ and Kyungsoo follows him back. Baekhyun squeaks happily and rolls around in his bed, clutching his laptop to his chest as Jongin sends him a judgemental look across the room where he’s buying another ‘daughter’ to add to his anime body pillow collection.  
  
“So he followed you, then?” Jongin asks.  
  
“Of course he did. I told you, our love is real!”  
  
“About as real as Chanyeol-hyung’s heterosexuality,” mutters Jongin.  
  
Baekhyun gives him a blank look. “Ha ha ha,” he says. “Hilarious, I’m sure. I don’t think you fully understand what this means, Jongin. What _our love_ means.”  
  
“Me getting traumatised for the rest of my life whilst you jerk off to his latest Girls’ Generation cover?”  
  
The retort on the tip of Baekhyun’s tongue dies away and his breath catches in his throat. Kyungsoo has uploaded a new Girls’ Generation cover? Which means Kyungsoo likes Girls’ Generation? Which means Kyungsoo is…singing Taeyeon’s lines? Which means Kyungsoo is his fated partner and one true love and destined to elope with him in a small marriage ceremony in the countryside and raise three Girls’ Generation-loving children in a secure, suburban environment with a spacious backyard and a tyre swing? Holy shit, Baekhyun thinks he’s hyperventilating. He _is_ hyperventilating. Kyungsoo _and_ Girls’ Generation in one video? This is way too much for a human being to handle.  
  
“I,” he begins, and when he finishes that train of thought, he’s suddenly lying on his back with a damp towel on his head, Jongin fanning him a magazine rolled up in his hand. Everything is swirling around him as he stares up at the ceiling. Had there always been mould growing in his room? It kind of looks like what Baekhyun imagines Kyungsoo would look like, if Kyungsoo were a small green fungus with a cocksucking mouth. He feels dizzy? And, like, whooshy? Whooshy like a cherry blossom tree swaying in the midst of the moshpit at a hardcore Norwegian death metal? And why is everything phrased with an upward inflection? He is so confused.  
  
“What happened—Jongin, please tell me that is not Volume 135 of High Cut rolled up in your gorilla hands. Please tell me you haven’t got your nasty Cheeto-dusty fingers on Taeyeon’s beautiful, angelic face.”  
  
“Oops,” says Jongin. He hastily smoothes it out on his lap, but the damage is done. Baekhyun shakes his head dejectedly and snatches it out of Jongin’s hands, placing it far, far away from danger. Luckily for him, Baekhyun always buys two copies of each magazine—one for reading purposes and one for his collection, each issue sealed in a glass frame hidden super-secretly in a super-secret place.  
  
“I hope you have a really good excuse as to why you were fondling Seohyun’s left nostril,” says Baekhyun.  
  
“Um, I told you about Kyungsoo uploading a new video and you started having a Girls’ Generation/Kyungsoo induced panic attack. And then you passed out for, like, ten minutes. And then you woke up and yelled at me. And here we are.”  
  
“All is forgiven if you pass me my laptop,” Baekhyun says, and Jongin nods, hurriedly picking up Baekhyun’s Macbook from where it’d toppled off the bed and onto the floor.  
  
Stroking it gently, Baekhyun whispers a quiet apology to his baby, and then stares at Jongin with murder in his eyes until Jongin gets the hint and skulks off into his side of the bedroom, keeping a wary eye on his super cool, super hot and super sexy roommate. Immediately, Baekhyun clicks on the icon where he’s bookmarked xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx’s channel and braces himself as Kyungsoo’s latest video buffers.  
  
  
 **[[#35](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%2335)] The Boys – GIRLS’ GENERATION**  
[13,045 views]  
Published 6 hours ago  
xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx [Subscribed]  
  
  
This is it. This is the moment he’s been waiting for his entire life.  
  
The video plays, and Baekhyun is so hard right now.  
  
“I cannot believe you never thought to introduce me to your boyfriend’s sexy roommate who is also a Girls’ Generation fan and basically the man of my dreams,” he says slowly, shifting his pillow over his crotch so he doesn’t accidentally on purpose stab Jongin in the eye with his dick and let Jongin bleed to death. Blood is difficult to clean off un-laminated High Cut magazines. “You are dead to me.”  
  
“I wouldn’t exactly describe Kyungsoo-hyung as ‘sexy,’” Jongin says, and shuts up when Baekhyun launches a pair of dirty boxers at him. “Okay, I get it; it’s your ‘realer than SasuNaru love’ or whatever. Which, by the way, is semantically null because nothing is realer than the love between Sasuke and Naruto, but we’re getting off-topic. I’m just saying, hyung, that Kyungsoo-hyung might not be everything your sex-crazed delusional fanboy mind has hyped him up to be. Don’t count your magical girls before they transform, you know?”  
  
Is Jongin giving him advice which he should probably listen to because it’s actually moderately helpful? Unacceptable. His ammunition of two-week old underwear is running low so he settles for throwing a few barbed comments about Jongin’s weakass 2 IV, bold-natured, level 11 Skitty. The sound of Jongin’s hopes and dreams shattering in a matter of seconds is a wonderful background soundtrack as he sends Kyungsoo a direct message on Twitter expressing his immense boner at Kyungsoo’s new video, except in a normal, non-creepy way that is appropriate for someone he’s just met online. Kyungsoo’s last tweet had been six hours ago, shamelessly self-advertising his own video like the sexily ambitious man he is, so Baekhyun doesn’t expect an immediate reply, but surprisingly, Kyungsoo answers two minutes later in his punctuation-allergic typing. _Be still, my racing heart,_ Baekhyun tells himself, placing his hand on his chest and inhaling deeply. He is so ready for this.  
  
  
Kyungsoo **@madamada_dane**  
Thanks  
  
  
The sexual tension is almost too much to handle. Kyungsoo has such a dirty-talking mouth, but Baekhyun likes men who are freaky in the sheets.  
  
“JONGIN, HE REPLIED,” squeals Baekhyun.  
  
Half-intrigued, Jongin glances over and asks, “What did he say?”  
  
“He said, _Thanks!_ Except without the exclamation mark; that was just my loins being set alight by the fire of our love,” says Baekhyun. Jongin turns back around. “Don’t you give me that look, young man! I should’ve known; you’re jealous, aren’t you? Sehun isn’t enough to satisfy you so you have to take out your sexual frustration on poor anime girls printed on cheap 47% cotton pillows.”  
  
Jongin makes a small, annoyed sound and sighs. “I won’t stand in the way of your ‘real love,’ but just remember what I said, hyung. Don’t blame me if anything happens.”


	2. Chapter 2

Kyungsoo, Baekhyun soon discovers, is not entirely as exciting (or sexual. Or sexually exciting.) as his voice suggests.  
  
Baekhyun blames Jongin. Kyungsoo is Sehun’s roommate and Sehun is Jongin’s boyfriend so ergo, it is Jongin’s fault that the whole thing is falling apart. Plus, Jongin had said not to blame him if anything happened. Nothing happened, so Baekhyun takes that as an okay to blame Jongin for everything.  
  
The problem is not that Kyungsoo doesn’t like him or anything. At least Baekhyun doesn’t think Kyungsoo hates him. It’s more of a communication barrier, of sorts. When he’d said that nothing had happened, he hadn’t been lying: literally, nothing had happened. Kyungsoo isn’t the best conversationalist, which Baekhyun would normally find hot as such qualities would imply an enigmatic sexy lone-wolfiness about him, but Baekhyun is beginning to get frustrated when he just doesn’t know what to say, holding himself back from gushing about the certain nuance of Kyungsoo’s voice that makes his dick need-a-blood-transplant hard, and Kyungsoo simply replies monosyllabically or with the ever-soul-crushing(ly sexy) _I see._ Baekhyun’s kind of gotten over the over-imaginative, obsessive fanboy phase and he’s starting to see what Jongin had said about not counting magical girls. He’s too pretty to be wrong and he doesn’t want to admit that Jongin had been right, so that’s another reason he’s using to blame Jongin for the Failure of Everything, Ever.  
  
“This is all your fault, Jongin,” Baekhyun says, wiggling his toes as he waits for the blue polish to dry. “Goddammit, Jongin.”  
  
They’re over at Jongdae’s apartment today—Baekhyun, Jongdae and Jongin. It has been one and half weeks since the Kyungsoo Incident and things are not progressing to the Awkwardly Sexy Skype Sex stage as quickly as Baekhyun had hoped. To be honest, things have not even progressed past the ‘hi-hi-how are you-I’m okay-cool-cool’ stage yet, which means it is time for Drastic Measures. Baekhyun has called an emergency meeting at Jongdae’s apartment because there is gratuitous nudity and he has food in his fridge that isn’t expired and a massive television, and whilst Chanyeol and Zitao are supposed to be here too, they’re probably off somewhere whipping each other and sucking each other’s dicks. That sounds kind of fun, but there are more pressing matters that require urgent attention and Baekhyun cannot afford to indulge in such amorous activities until Kyungsoo is sending him emoji sexts on his phone whilst Jongin reads over his shoulder and is scarred for life.  
  
“Goddammit, Jongin,” says Jongdae. He blows on his fingernails where they’re covered in clear polish; Baekhyun’s are hot pink, but obviously, Jongdae isn’t the free spirit he is. Baekhyun is a free person, free like the food samples at Costco, and will not be held down by The Man. “I wasn’t even listening to what you were saying but if we’re blaming people, I want to join in. Goddammit, Jongin!”  
  
“I didn’t even do anything,” Jongin protests. Baekhyun has banned him from getting his nails lacquered as a punishment; he must sit and watch in silent agony. He doesn’t look too upset about it, but Baekhyun knows he’s just putting up a front and trying to be strong. It would be touching if Baekhyun cared.  
  
Baekhyun gropes around for a sock to throw at Jongin’s face. There is no sock. Jongdae’s apartment is annoyingly clean, so he settles for throwing a foam toe-separator at Jongin’s eyeball. “It is your fault. Do not deny it, Jongin. That is the greatest sin.”  
  
“Look, I told you not to get all hyped up on your fantasies—“  
  
“Gay porn fantasies?” Jongdae pipes up, suddenly interested. Baekhyun kicks him and smudges his little toe. Jongdae slaps his thigh for smudging blue nail polish on his brand new nipple tassels. This is truly a sad day for humanity.  
  
“—but what did you do? You got all hyped up on your fantasies—“  
  
“Gay porn fantasies?” Jongdae asks again. Baekhyun kicks him again. Jongdae is so _sexual._ He’s sitting in the middle of the lounge with just nipple tassels and sperm-killingly tight pants. Why isn’t Kyungsoo being sexual and wearing nipple tassels and tight pants??? Why are the wrong people wrongly sexual???  
  
“—and now, you’re disappointed because he didn’t live up to your expectations. Not gay porn expectations.”  
  
“I did not have fantasies about him. I just have an overactive imagination,” huffs Baekhyun. “Besides, they were already there, laid out in the contextual foundations of our sexually tense conversations. And when did you become all Cosmopolitan Issue 69? God, I need a drink.”  
  
The trek to the kitchen is approximately fifty-eight million miles long because Baekhyun is trying not to smudge his toes so he’s wobbling like pregnant, drunk penguin, and Jongdae’s apartment is massive. Both Jongdae and Zitao live by themselves, but Zitao has a small, studio apartment that smells like dog piss and potpourri (which makes sense because Zitao has a dog and enjoys the scent of dead plants) whereas Jongdae lives in a huge penthouse apartment with, like, nine fridges, a sixty-inch television and a disturbingly large collection of women’s lingerie (which does not make sense because he’s Jongdae). Baekhyun actually earns a steady income from his part-time job at Didwey Worl and as a Youtuber, enough so he could live alone or with just one roommate, but he spends it all on Taeyeon merchandise and lube, the real necessities in life. How Jongdae can afford to live here when he doesn’t have a job—or so Baekhyun assumes because when he asks, Jongdae just laughs and taps his nose knowingly like the snotty, asthmatic pigfucker he is—Baekhyun has no idea. He would hate Jongdae for it if they didn’t need a place to discuss Important Sexy Anonymous Singer Problems like the Mature Cherry Blossom Tree Adults they are.  
  
“I’m drinking your last orange juicebox,” Baekhyun calls, grabbing the Capri-Sun pouch and stabbing it open with such precise skill that his fingernails remain completely perfect and shiny like the glossy waterfalls of Kyungsoo’s fruity-smelling hair (probably). The six-pack of beer at the bottom of the fridge is tempting, but he must be sober so he can concentrate all his efforts on charming his way onto Kyungsoo’s Skype contact list.  
  
“That’s okay,” says Jongdae as Baekhyun returns. He snaps his fingers. “Charles will stock it up for me.”  
  
“Charles?”  
  
“Oh, he’s just my butler.”  
  
Baekhyun tries not to think too hard about what that means.  
  
“Anyway, putting aside the sudden revelation that you have a fucking butler and the rest of us are dying from dysentery,” he says, “perhaps we should return to the matter at hand. Operation: Seduce xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx. AKA, Operation: Seduce Kyungsoo. AKA, Operation: Make My Not-Gay-Porn-Not-Fantasies-About-Kyungsoo a REALITY.”  
  
Jongdae applauds emotionlessly. Jongin looks depressed.  
  
“That’s the spirit!” says Baekhyun enthusiastically. He sucks on the straw of his juicebox until it caves in and holds it up like that scene in _The Lion King_ where Rafiki presents baby Simba as a sacrificial token to the Norse God of Sexy Blonde Hotties, Thor. Or something. He hadn’t really been paying attention the last time he’d watched it, what with Jongdae sticking his tongue down his throat and all, because they used to have a thing that wasn’t really a thing but was still kind of a thing. It’s not weird. Really, it’s not weird.  
  
(It’s a little bit weird.)  
  
“Let us be civilised about this. Democracy is the key to a functional society,” Baekhyun declares. “Whoever holds the sacred juicebox will be granted the right to talk. Understand?”  
  
Jongdae nods and his nipple tassels ripple in the breeze of the air conditioning. Baekhyun wants to be disgusted, but his apartment doesn’t even have air conditioning. Jongin still looks depressed.  
  
“Now, who would like to have the highest honour of being the first person to help me get into Kyungsoo’s cyber pants?”  
  
Jongdae raises his hand and Baekhyun passes him the juicebox. “Testing, testing, one two three,” he says into the straw. “Baekhyun smells like shit. Hahaha.”  
  
Baekhyun is about to say something really insulting about Jongdae’s mother’s weight before Jongdae waves the juicebox at him and he remembers that he can’t talk. Dammit. A descent into anarchy would only mean that they would get nowhere with this problem so Baekhyun refrains from punching Jongdae in the nose and allows Jongin to take the juicebox from Jongdae’s hands.  
  
“Look, hyung,” Jongin says, sounding a lot like a tired mother whose son is fifty-three, unemployed and still lives at home where he writes bad fanfiction about Korean idols and his little ponies. “Why don’t you try talking to him like a normal person instead of the crazy fanboy you are? Try talking to him like a friend, except, y’know, with less threats of killing him, because, like I said before, he isn’t everything you’ve hyped him up to be. He’s just a normal guy, so—“  
  
Ugh, Jongin is being all wisdom-y and teen-girl-magazine again. Baekhyun doesn’t understand how Jongin knows so much about relationships when he’s, like, twelve years old and calls himself ‘Sailor Senshi Kai.’ Baekhyun doesn’t approve of this. Grabbing the juicebox from Jongin, he says, “AHEM. _Jongdae,_ do you have any pearls of wisdom you would like to impart regarding my currently dilemma? Maybe about Kyungsoo being a normal person?”  
  
“Well,” says Jongdae, accepting the juicebox, “personally, _I_ think you should try talking to him like a normal person instead of the crazy fanboy you are. Try talking to him like a, uh, friend, except with less threats of killing him, because, like I said before, he isn’t everything you’ve hyped him up to be in your gay porn fantasies. He’s just a normal guy, like you commoners, so—“  
  
“—talk to him like a normal guy,” whispers Jongin.  
  
“—talk to him like a normal guy,” Jongdae finishes.  
  
“Wow, what a GOOD idea, Jongdae!” says Baekhyun. “Sometimes, I think you may be the wisest of us all.”  
  
“Thank you, Baekhyun,” Jongdae says. “I thought of it all by myself.”  
  
“And I am proud of you,” Baekhyun says. “Now, this leads us to another problem. Talking to Kyungsoo is perfectly fine but I have no idea what to talk about. When you’ve praised his Girls’ Generation cover, like, fifty times over, you kind of run out of things to say. Suggestions?”  
  
“Penises.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Dildos.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Vibrating dildos.”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Okay, let’s look at this from a new angle—vibrating _assholes._ ”  
  
“No. Nothing that vibrates or is even remotely penis-y. I want him to think I’m, like, cultured and cool, not a sausage-fest enthusiast. Next?”  
  
Jongdae throws his hands up. “Welp, that’s me done. That’s all I’ve got.”  
  
Useless. “Jongin?” says Baekhyun.  
  
“Um, I dunno,” says Jongin. He’s avoiding Baekhyun’s eyes, which means he knows something. And he’s trying to hide it. Not very well, evidently.  
  
“Jongin,” coos Baekhyun. Jongin is now looking very pointedly at the tiny speck of Cheeto dust on his thumb as if it’s the most interesting speck of Cheeto dust in the world. “Jongin, you know you’ve always been my favourite, right? I love you, Jongin, in a platonic, best friend kind of way. Now, having discovered my newfound love for you, don’t you want to show your appreciation by telling hyung what Kyungsoo likes?”  
  
“I dunno,” says Jongin. “He’s not my friend. He is mysterious, like a person who is very mysterious. Like the Cheeto dust on my thumb. Mysterious. I haven’t even eaten Cheetos today. Really.”  
  
“Okay, Jongin,” says Baekhyun, falsely sweet. He signals to Jongdae. “You know what to do.”  
  
The only slightly redeeming quality about Jongdae that Baekhyun tolerates, apart from sucking a bitchin’ cock, is the fact that Jongdae does not discriminate. He does not care about sides. If there’s a chance to make fun of someone, he’ll take it. It doesn’t always work to Baekhyun’s advantage, but in this case, Jongin is going to repent for his crimes.  
  
Jongdae nods. In a dramatic voice, he begins to read from his phone: “Sasuke tenderly caressed Naruto’s face and leaned in close until he could feel Naruto’s rock-hard shuriken pressing into his—“  
  
“HE LIKES ANIME,” says Jongin loudly and quickly, eyes wide. “PLEASE. DON’T READ. ANYMORE.”  
  
“What a shame,” Jongdae says. “It was really quite good up until the part where Sasuke inserted his throbbing nunchuck into Naruto’s warm, wet rice cooker.”  
  
Jongin whimpers, and whilst Baekhyun normally feeds off Jongin’s humiliation, he has more important things to think about. So, Kyungsoo is into anime. Makes sense that Sehun’s his roommate and Jongin is his friend then, because Sehun is practically Every Shoujo Anime Protagonist’s Love Interest Ever and Jongin is Jongin. It’s not devastatingly horrible; Baekhyun can do anime. He can work with anime. Heck, he likes anime. Before, he used watched loads of anime with Jongdae, his old roommate during freshman year. Granted, they’d watched the ones where the cute schoolboys in uniforms tied each other up and the big-boobed teachers seduced the nerds of the class, but whatever. It still counts. Honestly, he prefers the much more mentally stimulating Korea’s Next Top Model, but yeah, he can work with anime.  
  
He tries it out as soon as he gets home, nails fully dried and manicured. Jongin is taking an early night to recover from today’s episode of Let’s Traumatise the Fuck out of Jongin! so Baekhyun is lying on his bed in the dark with a blanket thrown over his head as he types out a message to Kyungsoo on Twitter.  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
sooooooooo i heard from a little nerd that you like anime ಠ◡ಠ  
  
Kyungsoo **@madamada_dane**  
Yes…?  
  
  
 _Oh my god_ , Baekhyun thinks. Kyungsoo is using punctuation. The sexual tension is strong tonight.  
  
  
Kyungsoo **@madamada_dane**  
Btw whats with the weird emoji face………………………….? lol  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
wow rude that is my face irl  
ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ  
ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ  
  
Kyungsoo **@madamada_dane**  
⊙_⊙  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
ಥ⌣ಥ  
✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ:* \\(◕ω◕✿)/ *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧  
  
Kyungsoo **@madamada_dane**  
Lol...sehun didnt tell me you were a weirdo….thats ok though i guess  
  
  
After exchanging more emoji faces and quips about their incompetent roommates, over time, Baekhyun realises the weird thing is that he doesn’t mind Kyungsoo isn’t super sexual with tasselled nipples and tight pants. Talking to Kyungsoo like this, when he isn’t acting like Kyungsoo’s the inventor of lube and the subsequent saviour of the world, is so much easier. It isn’t so awkward. Baekhyun doesn’t have to watch what he says; it’s fine as long as he remembers it’s socially unacceptable to tell someone he wants their voices to get married and have cute voice babies, and Kyungsoo is refreshingly normal. Baekhyun still really likes him, even though he’s getting over the OH MY GOD OH MY GOD *HOARDS ALL OPPA’S BODY PART TUMBLR URLS* phase, and more than wanting to bang Kyungsoo in the Creepy Overly-Obsessed Fanboy way, he genuinely just wants to be Kyungsoo’s friend because Kyungsoo is just an ordinary guy, and yeah, Baekhyun likes guys with glistening abs and hair like honey-butter chips, but he also likes Kyungsoo.  
  
He knows he likes Kyungsoo, quickly becoming comfortable friends, because he still doesn’t know what Kyungsoo looks like and yet he logs onto Skype every day just to see Kyungsoo’s drawled typing (he’d wheedled Kyungsoo’s username out of him after he’d stayed up for two consecutive nights to watch the entire series of Prince of Tennis so he could understand all of Kyungsoo’s references like the cultured person he pretends to be. Twice.) For all he knows, Kyungsoo could be, like, three feet tall with seven tentacles and that would be okay. Baekhyun’s into that anyway—he prefers the term ‘open-minded’ to ‘sex-nasty’—and Sehun, true to his word, was right about Kyungsoo being a douchebag. Maybe Baekhyun’s masochistic, but he doesn’t really mind when he sends jokey hearts and emojis to Kyungsoo and Kyungsoo replies with _Gross_ or asterisked violent actions. He just takes it as a symbol of their Everlasting Friendship. Kyungsoo’s pretty funny too; granted, most of the time, he’s making fun of Baekhyun for uploading another Girls’ Generation cover.  
  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Dont you listen to anything other than girls generation…wow  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
wow whats wrong with girls generation dont be a hater  
taeyeon is my queen  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
I prefer 2ne1  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
of course u would…>_>  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Lol  
You know i watched a few of your videos even before you started talking to me  
Not too shabby  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
i’ll take that as a compliment ಠ◡ಠ  
i guess ur more of an rnb/soul singer tho??? nice. ur voice suits that type of music more  
snsd cover still slays tho  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Funny how the cover i uploaded for my friend as a joke is the most popular  
Bet you jerked off to it  
Nasty  
  
  
Baekhyun isn’t totally lying when he types back _no_ quickly. He’d fingered himself, actually. Platonically fingered. In the shower. Good times.  
  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Lol…sure……i believe you  
Anyway what did you do today…  
Just stayed at home and watched some model show with sehun  
For someone who claims to like boys sehun knows an awful lot about victorias secret…its disturbing  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
i watched a sports thing w chanyeol (the other annoying rmt who isn’t jongin)  
yeah thats why sehun gets along so well w my friend jongdae  
they’re both satan’s children so it’s pretty scary  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Ew sports  
Jongdae?  
Feel like ive heard that name before…i dunno  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
ok thank goodness i didnt really watch sports i actually got another manicure  
men can get those you know  
it’s Manly.  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
‘Another’ manicure  
‘Another’  
‘ANOTHER’  
I am threatened by your masculinity  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
…………………………  
shut up it’s manly ok  
“Manicures are manly” – something taeyeon said once probably  
see look taeyeon likes men who get manicures  
and i am a man who gets manicures  
we are so real  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Lol okay whatever  
Gtg sehun is threatening to cut the wifi and slash or buy just 1ply toilet paper for grocery shopping if i dont make him dinner  
Truly satans child  
He knows i have a high fibre diet  
  
 **stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
weak, man  
  
 **Kyungsoo**  
Says the one who lives off shrimp instant ramen  
Thats not even the best flavour  
  
  
Baekhyun replies with a scathing remark about Kyungsoo’s poor taste in instant ramen flavours, but the swirling circle next to the timestamp tells Baekhyun Kyungsoo has just logged off. He’s a bit awkward like that; he never really says _Hello_ or _Bye_ and when he doesn’t really know what to say, he usually replies with, _Shut up or Im booking the first train to punch you in the appendix._ It’s endearing, Baekhyun thinks. He’s so…different from Jongdae and Chanyeol, who are loud and obnoxious, and Zitao and Jongin, who are probably secret alien agents sent to invade Earth and assimilate so they can steal Baekhyun’s vibrators, and he’s different in a good way. Baekhyun hasn’t ever met someone like him before—he isn’t usually the type of person Baekhyun would be friends with. If they’d bumped into each other on the street a few years ago, Baekhyun doesn’t think he would even give Kyungsoo a second glance, so he’s glad for this. Despite being a total contrast from each other, they’re also surprisingly similar: they both enjoy bullying their friends; they have a shared interest of singing (Baekhyun lets it slide that Kyungsoo isn’t a devoted follower of Taeyeonism), and they both like food. Well, Kyungsoo likes cooking and Baekhyun likes eating. Same thing. So, yeah, Baekhyun’s glad for this. He’s happy about this.  
  
“Chanyeol-hyung’s ordered pizza and fried chicken,” Jongin says, popping his head around the door. Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior gallops into the room with all the grace of a majestic unicorn, butting Baekhyun on the leg with his head. Baekhyun grins, and then he realises he’s already been grinning for the past half-hour talking online. “You coming?”  
  
“Yeah,” says Baekhyun. “Gimme one sec.”  
  
He leaves a message for Kyungsoo in case Kyungsoo returns: _going 2 eat pizza MOTHERFUCKER lol enjoy ur gluten free anti carb shit dinner with the devil child. msg me on kakao if ur bk,_ and then he signs out and switches off his laptop. He doesn’t even yell at Jongin for disturbing him during his Alone Time as he scoops up Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior into his arms and follows the scent of pepperoni into the kitchen. He’s been yelling a lot less at Jongin and if Jongin has noticed, he hasn’t said anything in order to preserve this fragile peace between them.  
  
And if Baekhyun weren’t so distracted by bitterly thinking, _I thought you didn’t even like fried chicken, you dumb dog,_ as Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior tries to steal food out of his hands, he might’ve noticed the pizza settling into a swooping warmth in his stomach that has been there ever since.

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
“Did something happen?”  
  
Annoyed, Baekhyun quickly hisses, “Dumb roommate alert,” into his mic to Kyungsoo and swivels around in his desk chair to face Jongin, pulling down the left side of his headphones so they sit lopsided on his head. Jongin is looking at him with a mix of curiosity and worry, his chin nestling on the curly fur of Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’s head. Baekhyun scowls back at him.  
  
“What?” he says in irritation. From the right side of his ear, he can hear Kyungsoo giggling obnoxiously at him. Just calling Kyungsoo and talking to him, vocally, over Skype is easier than typing, and his normal voice isn’t that much different from his singing. He talks in a smooth drawl, the way Baekhyun had imagined from how he types, and he has a habit of saying _umm_ and _uhh_ and _I’ll kick you in your balls_ a little bit too much. It’s fun to get on his nerves, Baekhyun thinks, especially when he can make Kyungsoo do that kind of cute high-pitched squeaky thing when he’s angry. He doesn’t want to doink voice-dicks anymore because they’ve gotten to nice place in between now, a place where Baekhyun considers Kyungsoo a good friend. It’s pretty sappy, but after college and work, talking to Kyungsoo is something he looks forward to, even if Kyungsoo just sends him mildly graphic death threats and complains about how _The New Prince of Tennis_ has totally butchered the original series.  
  
“Nothing, I just thought ‘cause Kyungsoo-hyung uploaded a new song…” Jongin says, trailing off. “It’s Girls’ Generation. Looks like you’ve had a bad influence on him.”  
  
Baekhyun actually has Kyungsoo’s new video open in a new tab:  
  
  
 **[[#38](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%2338)] 7989 – Taeyeon**  
[68, 384 views]  
Published 2 days ago  
xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx [Subscribed]  
  
  
His voice fits the song well. He had told Kyungsoo that and Kyungsoo had replied with _of course._ He hadn’t told Kyungsoo about the part where he’d felt weirdly hot at the same time as he’d felt shivers through his body; Kyungsoo had recorded with a certain rawness to Baekhyun’s found in all his videos. His videos aren’t perfect. He leaves in all the slight sharps and flats, an echo that lingers in Baekhyun’s head, and Baekhyun doesn’t think it’s just that Kyungsoo needs to get a better microphone. It’s captivating, different, and it makes him feel kind of like the first time he’d watched the Girls’ Generation _Girls’ Generation_ MV and Taeyeon’s high note had stolen his heart. But not quite. It’s something else. Briefly, he questions if Kyungsoo is trying to one-up him or something, but he likes a bit of competition anyway. Yesterday, he’d retaliated with Girls’ Generation’s _Trick,_ roughly covered in the bathroom whilst Jongin had been napping and Chanyeol had been drawing glasses and a moustache on his face with a Sharpie. It encourages him to work harder, if anything, and he feels like he’s slowly converting Kyungsoo to love the wonderful angel from heaven that is Kim Taeyeon.  
  
“Excuse you, I am an amazing influence,” Baekhyun says, and wonders why his chest feels so warm when Kyungsoo snickers deprecatingly into his ear. “Shut up, Kyungsoo. And you, Jongin, get out. The Adults have Adult Things to discuss.”  
  
Jongin throws one last glance back at Baekhyun before he leaves to feed Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior. Baekhyun can’t decipher the look in Jongin’s eyes. Nowadays, there’s a lot he doesn’t understand. They’re in a good place right now; he doesn’t want to ruin it with things he can’t comprehend. Why he’s always unconsciously smiling when Kyungsoo messages him with, _Get your ass online so i can kick it in LoL._ Why he feels…happier than he should be, maybe? Happier than he’s ever been, that’s for certain.  
  
Things are, Baekhyun thinks, starting to become complicated.  
  
“I’m back,” he says, swallowing down the doubt that forms as a lump in his throat. Baekhyun has never—he doesn’t like this kind of stuff. The whole emotions crap, which is why he doesn’t like relationships. He’s fine with people, has always been someone who’s outspoken and never stops talking, but he isn’t good at close friendships. It’s why he’s friends with, like, five assholes; it’s easier when there’s less people, less relationships to fuck up. He’s never been good at dealing with emotions so more often than not, he just pushes them away and skirts around the edges, around the precipice of wanting but—rather than being unable to have, it’s like he doesn’t _let_ himself have what he wants. Things are harder to fuck up when he doesn’t have something to fuck up in the first place. It’s easier like this.  
  
“Did you kick your roommate out?” Kyungsoo asks.  
  
“Yeah, of course,” replies Baekhyun. He hopes Kyungsoo can’t tell something’s off in his voice, but the conversation lulls for a moment until Baekhyun speaks up again. “Hey, so, just a question. I’m interested to know why you never show your face. I mean, you’ve seen mine, right? In videos. I think it’s only fair that it’s about time I see what you look like.”  
  
It’s been around a month and a bit since he’d started talking to Kyungsoo and in that space of time, he still hasn’t seen Kyungsoo’s face. He’s more intrigued to see if Kyungsoo actually has a face than wanting to see if Kyungsoo’s hot, and although he’s messaged Sehun about it a few times, Sehun just replies with laughing dog emojis to compensate for the empty abyss inside him where his soul should be. He’s almost certain Kyungsoo doesn’t have tentacles; from what he’s seen in films, having tentacles is pretty noisy business, what with all the squelching and penetrating and suctioning. In his head, he can kind of picture what Kyungsoo looks like from his voice—probably tall with nice eyebrows—but the curiosity to see what Kyungsoo looks like is overwhelming.  
  
There’s a pause of hesitation before Kyungsoo answers. “It’s for the good of the world,” he says, “because, you know, worldwide destruction of the female ovary.”  
  
“For some reason, I get the feeling that I’ll be fine,” Baekhyun replies dryly. “It’s just a hunch that I have. C’mon, Kyungsoo. Video-call? Please?”  
  
“But I’m actually really gross and ugly in real life and I have, like, seventy tentacles and five chins and unfashionable stubble.”  
  
“That’s okay,” Baekhyun says. “I’m into that.”  
  
“Of course you are,” Kyungsoo mutters into his mic, and Baekhyun laughs. “Okay, but if we video-call, you’ll be able to see that I’m not actually laughing every time I type _lol._ ”  
  
“I’m okay with that too,” says Baekhyun, and then hastily, he adds, “but, like, if you really don’t want to, I don’t actually mind. I guess I’m just curious to know. Sehun and Jongin are annoying shits who just wiggle their eyebrows whenever I ask them about it.”  
  
“Right,” says Kyungsoo. “So you don’t know anything?”  
  
Baekhyun shakes his head before he remembers Kyungsoo can’t see him. “Not a single thing. Jongin said, and I quote, that he wouldn’t describe you as ‘sexy,’ but I think otherwise.”  
  
“Wow, thank you. I’m thrilled to know you think that,” says Kyungsoo, not sounding very thankful at all, but a little amused. “I wouldn’t want to ruin your fanboy fantasy with my actual face.”  
  
“I don’t—I don’t have weird fanboy fantasies!” Baekhyun says huffily. Not anymore, anyway. “So, are we gonna do this? I don’t even mind if you, like, show me your foot or something. Just to ease you in. We can do faces another time.”  
  
“My foot. Good idea. We should get you used to seeing it before I shove it up your ass.”  
  
“Kinky,” says Baekhyun, and smiles to himself at Kyungsoo’s embarrassed protest as he answers, “Not in _that_ way!” Absentmindedly, Baekhyun notices his heart beating a little bit faster. He might get to see Kyungsoo’s face for the first time since he’d discovered Kyungsoo’s videos. The thought of it is as scary as it’s exciting.  
  
“Okay,” Kyungsoo finally says, letting out a breath. Baekhyun thinks it’s cute Kyungsoo’s nervous about this, but he’s nervous too. He’s not really sure what to expect. His hand is trembling on his mouse and he forces it to stop. “Okay, we can video-call. Just give me a second to prepare. The paper bag’s in the kitchen.”  
  
“C’mon, Kyungsoo. I bet you’re not even ugly. If I want to look at a Quentin Tarantino movie reject, I’ll look at Chanyeol.”  
  
“Your faith in me is admirable. I love it when you validate my self-worth through the internet,” says Kyungsoo. “Okay, I…I’ll call you. I’m gonna call you. Right now. Okay?”  
  
“Yeah,” says Baekhyun. “Okay.”  
  
Kyungsoo hangs up and types, _gonna video call,_ and Baekhyun’s heart races in trepidation. This isn’t like talking to Kyungsoo for the first time, typing messages through Twitter, or even calling him. He’s going to see Kyungsoo. He’s going to _see_ Kyungsoo talking to him, and it suddenly hits Baekhyun how real this is. How Kyungsoo isn’t just some guy over the internet, how he isn’t just a voice behind the black screen of his videos, how he isn’t just some pixels in the form of letters and sarcasm-laced words on the screen. This is so different, and he doesn’t think he would ever be ready enough for this, so he doesn’t hesitate one bit when ten seconds pass and then Kyungsoo is video-calling him, the familiar tune playing through Baekhyun’s headphones. If he isn’t ready now, then he’ll never be ready, so he takes the chance, the opportunity, and clicks the answer button.  
  
Two seconds for the picture to load; Baekhyun can see himself in the small square at the bottom, anxiety in his eyes and mouth pressed into a thin line. When Kyungsoo pops up on screen, Baekhyun’s breath catches in his throat.  
  
“Hi,” Kyungsoo simply says. He waves, hesitantly, nervously.  
  
Baekhyun is smiling. He can’t stop smiling. “H-hello,” he says, and he doesn’t trust himself to wave back because his hands are shaking so much, gripping on the armrests of his chair in a semblance of grounding himself to reality. This is happening. This is actually happening, and Kyungsoo is real. Kyungsoo is _real._ It feels like a dream, but it’s real. Kyungsoo is real. Baekhyun doesn’t think he can get over that. Kyungsoo is real. Kyungsoo is real. He’s so real and he’s talking to Baekhyun on screen, his teeth chewing his bottom lip and his eyes barely blinking. Baekhyun can’t really breathe right now, can’t really force the words out to talk, but he thinks it’s in a good way.  
  
“Has my face shocked you into a horrified silence,” says Kyungsoo wryly in an attempt to break the odd tension that’s formed, but he doesn’t sound very sure of himself. Baekhyun doesn’t understand why he has a reason not to be. Kyungsoo is…  
  
He’s not what Baekhyun had expected, but Baekhyun is okay with that. He thinks that speaks volumes without the words he can’t bring himself to say.  
  
“You’re being weirdly quiet. I don’t think you’ve been this quiet since that time I joked I hated Taeyeon,” says Kyungsoo. He’s trying to sound confident like he’s okay, just like how Baekhyun’s hiding his hands from the webcam so Kyungsoo can’t see how badly they’re shaking, but Kyungsoo is blushing. Even through the fuzzy image, Baekhyun can see the tips of Kyungsoo’s ears turning red as he stares at his desk. “I guess I’m really not what you thought I’d be, huh? Not the sex-god you’d envisioned in your fantasies?”  
  
Managing to gather the last dregs of his sanity, Baekhyun retorts, “I don’t have fantasies.”  
  
“And I’m a five-armed tentacle monster with seventy eight pimples and horns sticking out of my head.”  
  
“Don’t flatter yourself,” says Baekhyun, and Kyungsoo glances up to glare at him, his eyes squinting a bit. He really is nothing like Baekhyun had imagined and Baekhyun doesn’t know what this feeling is when he looks back at Kyungsoo.  
  
“Ha ha ha,” says Kyungsoo, and then, he wrings his hands together, unable to keep them still. Runs a hand through his hair, scratches his cheek with his index finger of his other hand, and looks into the webcam, straight at Baekhyun. “Seriously, though. I bet I’m not what you expected at all…”  
  
Baekhyun has to exhale, and then swallow thickly, before he’s certain his words won’t come out in a stuttering quiver. “Nah,” he says, and prays Kyungsoo can’t detect the hitch in his voice, “but I think you’re all right. I think you’re all right, just the way you are. Like this.”  
  
Kyungsoo’s entire face lights up into a grin and his eyes crinkle into these crescents that makes Baekhyun’s chest feel too tight all of a sudden, squeezing around his lungs so he can’t breathe. “I think my self-esteem just went up by, like, a hundred points,” Kyungsoo says. “I guess I should say something nice about you too…Your face is nice. Nicer like this, without editing and stuff. Just. Natural. It’s good.”  
  
“Just ‘good’?” says Baekhyun.  
  
“Hey, I’m just ‘all right’ according to you,” Kyungsoo says indignantly.  
  
Baekhyun laughs, but what Kyungsoo doesn’t know is ‘all right’ means a lot more than he thinks. He isn’t what Baekhyun had expected, isn’t at all what Baekhyun had thought he would be. He is…  
  
Better than anything Baekhyun had imagined.  
  
If there were such a thing as perfection, Kyungsoo, Baekhyun thinks, would be very, very close to it.  
  
  
  


♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
In their group of friends, and upsettingly, to most of the students in Baekhyun’s major, it’s common knowledge that Baekhyun and Jongdae used to fuck. It’d started in their first year, the sex, and they’d had a sort of thing, except it hadn’t really been a _thing_. They’d done it more out of convenience—Jongdae had been his roommate and he’d been there and it just seemed normal to do it. However, it’s not really common knowledge that whilst, yeah, they used to fuck, they _still_ fuck. It’s not like they’re purposefully keeping it a secret from their friends; it’s more like the topic of fucking your best friend on a biweekly basis never really comes up during conversations. Or something? It seems inevitable that they would end up fooling around together again, being the only two single guys amongst their friends. They don’t really talk about it. It’s not weird if they fuck. It’s weird if they talk about it, though, so they don’t. It’s easier. Baekhyun realises he does that a lot—avoid, skirt around the edges, so he doesn’t have to deal with things he doesn’t want to. So things are easier. He wonders how long it’ll be until he can’t do it anymore.  
  
They always do it at Jongdae’s apartment. Baekhyun is the one who goes there the most; sometimes, it’s just to freeload off Jongdae’s Wi-Fi and watch a few movies together whilst getting totally masculine manicures because they actually do get along pretty well when they’re not tearing at each other’s throats, but most of the time, it’s for sex. Plus, doing it here means there are fewer interruptions from unwanted roommates and fewer back-rashes from Baekhyun’s cheap, third-rate bedsheets. Jongdae has silk bed-sheets. Baekhyun still doesn’t know what the hell Jongdae does for a living, but he doesn’t think it’s particularly appropriate to ask right now when Jongdae’s tugging his pants down and sliding his hands along the pale expanse of Baekhyun’s thigh, his mouth dropping a kiss to the apex of his legs.  
  
Lips.  
  
Baekhyun’s eyes fly open. The image of soft, plush lips, like a heart, pops into his mind, pink and red and bitten. Jongdae’s mouth isn’t like that. Jongdae has a wide mouth, perfect for sucking dick, which Baekhyun wishes Jongdae would put to use more often instead of using it for snippy, bitchy remarks, but his lips are thin and curved up at the corner, like a kitty. Baekhyun doesn’t dwell on what that means because he doesn’t want to, more than anything, and pushes it out of his mind, closing his eyes again and sighing when Jongdae moves back up to kiss his stomach, hands cupping Baekhyun’s hard dick.  
  
“You might wanna lay off the honey-butter chips, dude,” says Jongdae, laughing into the soft skin of Baekhyun’s tummy. Trust him to say something like that during sex.  
  
Baekhyun rolls his eyes and smacks Jongdae upside the head. “Why don’t you do something useful with your mouth and suck my cock already,” Baekhyun says. Jongdae puts up a front, but when it comes down to it, he’s a bottom bitch who does everything Baekhyun says.  
  
Jongdae mouths at Baekhyun’s cock through his underwear, his lips fitting around the bulge of Baekhyun’s cock as his tongue slides wetly over the material of Baekhyun’s Spongebob boxers. In reality, they’re Chanyeol’s boxers which Baekhyun had won fair and square in a game of Who Can Drink the Most of This Five Month Old Syphilitic Milk Without Throwing Up? but he feels like it’s probably a bad time to tell Jongdae that. For a moment, he wonders if it’s cheating if Jongdae is sucking his dick through Chanyeol’s underwear—like, by proxy, he’s also sucking Chanyeol’s dick, which is disturbing to think about—and then he decides he doesn’t care because Jongdae is pulling them off his hips so he can curl a hand around the base of Baekhyun’s cock, pumping up in one long stroke.  
  
“Hello old friend,” he says. “Lovely to meet you again.”  
  
“My dick is not old,” says Baekhyun, “and he’s not going to be your friend unless you fucking—shit, Jongdae!”  
  
His head tips back as a sudden pleasure runs through his body, Jongdae taking his cock into his mouth with no preamble. Jongdae’s mouth is wet and hot and it feels, Baekhyun reluctantly admits, amazing around his cock as his tongue presses to the slit and laps up the precome that’s leaking out from how aroused Baekhyun is. It’s one of those days; Jongdae wastes no time in pushing down till his lips touch the base of Baekhyun’s dick, the tip nudging the back of his throat—he’s going to get Baekhyun off as quick as he can. It’s a competition to see who can do better. Unfortunately for Jongdae, Baekhyun’s learned a few tricks and he’s more than eager to use Jongdae as a test subject.  
  
As he tangles his hands in Jongdae’s hair, he’s become so accustomed to Jongdae’s body that he can still picture him in the darkness behind his closed eyelids. He thinks of soft hair, dark hair, silky hair that slips through his fingers when he tugs. Soft hair that shines in the incandescence of the desk lamp, soft hair that probably smells like store-bought shampoo. Soft hair that’s all mussed up from bad habits, from nervousness, from hands running through; soft hair that falls over thick eyebrows and wide eyes, pretty eyes, earnest eyes, and eyes that never blink. With a start, Baekhyun opens his eyes and Jongdae’s nasty poodle hair, fried ever since he’d dyed it and let Zitao attack it with a curler, comes into view. That isn’t quite what he’d been thinking of and he’s not so naïve that he doesn’t know what this means. There is a difference, though, between knowing and accepting, and he’s not sure if he’s ready.  
  
And then, something echoes in his mind: if he isn’t ready now, then he’ll never be. Take the chance, take the opportunity.  
  
Be brave.  
  
When he comes into Jongdae’s mouth, it feels like a revelation. He blinks, rapidly, like it’ll help him to understand the feeling that’s bursting in his chest and his stomach and every cell in his body, but it’s overwhelming. To admit that he likes Kyungsoo, to admit that Kyungsoo has become more than a voice. To admit that Kyungsoo is more than someone behind a computer. Baekhyun is so used to running away, and this feeling—he thinks it’s telling him he doesn’t want to run away anymore. He wants more and this time, he thinks he isn’t so scared of letting himself have it.  
  
“I like him,” he says, quietly. “I like him. So much.”  
  
“Ew, feelings. I’m breaking up with your dick, Baekhyun,” says Jongdae.  
  
Baekhyun gives him a dead look. “Kyungsoo, you shithead.”  
  
“Your internet predator-crush? Oh, Romeo. Your charms have swept me off my feet.”  
  
“If anyone’s the internet predator here, it’s you,” snaps Baekhyun, suddenly feeling defensive. “I’ve seen the sketchy websites you go on.”  
  
“I’m an adult; it’s legit, all right?” Jongdae says. “And okay, nice to know that me sucking your dick has, like, mystical enlightening powers, good for you, etcetera etcetera, but”—he gestures at his pants where Baekhyun can see his cock tenting between his legs—“I just sucked you off. That wasn’t for free, you know.”  
  
Baekhyun undoes Jongdae’s pants and tugs at his dick, but it’s a half-hearted effort. He feels like he’s cheating on Kyungsoo, kind of, even though they’re not a Thing yet. There is so much indirect cheating today. He is spiralling into a life of crime. Next thing he knows, he’ll be following Jongin’s footsteps, illegally torrenting bad children’s films and mainstream anime off the internet and hiding them in a folder named ‘Pictures of Monggu’ because it’s not like anyone will look in there, right? He doesn’t think he’s exactly worked out what Kyungsoo is to him yet, and maybe he never will, but finding out...well, that’s just part of the journey, isn’t it? Isn’t that what makes it so fun and exciting, being in—the word ‘love’ flashes in Baekhyun’s mind and he blushes. Not ‘love,’ but maybe an intense ‘like.’ Hopefully, a mutual ‘like.’  
  
“God, you fucking suck,” Jongdae sighs, smacking Baekhyun’s hand away. “I wish that was in the literal sense. I’m not even hard anymore. You ruined it, with your stupid deep thoughts about emotions and stuff.”  
  
“But I just,” Baekhyun says lamely, wiping his dicky hand on Jongdae’s bedspread and tucking his own dick back into his adulterant underwear, “I just like him so much.”  
  
“And…?”  
  
“And?” Baekhyun says, shaking Jongdae’s shoulders. “What am I supposed to do!!!!! I just had an enlightening moment! A revelation! A life-changing realisation, which, true to its name, has changed my life!!”  
  
“Okaaaaaay, because it’s not like you’ve been totally in love with Kyungsoo since, like, the dawn of time and had gay porn fantasies about him or anything,” Jongdae says. “Yes that is totally something I totally did not know and wow I am so surprised like wow I cannot even oh my gosh how will I handle this oh no dramatic anime gasp.”  
  
Baekhyun stares at him. “What.”  
  
“What,” says Jongdae.  
  
“What do you mean...about what you just said?”  
  
“Oh, the whole ‘you’re totally in love with Kyungsoo except you’re too stupid and too much of a coward to admit it even though you’ve had disgusting pornographic dreams about him ever since that “anonymous” commenter posted on your video’ thing? I think the name is pretty self-explanatory.”  
  
“And you knew? And you never thought to, like, oh, I don’t know, _tell me_ or anything? You just sucked my dick, dude! Knowing that I like Kyungsoo? What the fucking _fuck!_ ”  
  
“Not gonna say no to free dick,” says Jongdae, and for a moment, his eyes harden. “Besides, what you and Kyungsoo do is none of my business. Whether you like him or not, that’s not my problem. It’s your problem, isn’t it? It’s your problem if you won’t face up to it. I’m just a side character to this great love story of yours.”  
  
Baekhyun lets out an anguished wail and flops onto Jongdae’s bed, burying his head into Jongdae’s pillow. It smells nice, like coconuts or something. He bets Kyungsoo’s hair smells like coconuts. Or some other exotic fruit. Weirdly, hair always seems to smell like fruit.  
  
“Oh, shit,” Jongdae says, hesitantly reaching out to pat Baekhyun’s head. Baekhyun makes a noise like a dying sheep. “Okay, I hadn’t meant to say that in a mean way. Are you actually…crying? I can’t deal with crying. Unless it’s, like, sexy spanking crying. Should I spank you or something? I know that would make me feel a lot better.”  
  
“I’m sad because I’m an idiot!” Baekhyun howls into the Rilakkuma teddy by the side of the pillow. “I’m so stupid, Jongdae. Why do I _live!?_ ”  
  
“It’s okay,” says Jongdae. “I already knew that. We can’t all be as wise as I am, but I guess that’s what makes you a loveable, relatable protagonist. Arguably.”  
  
Baekhyun looks up for long enough to punch Jongdae’s kneecap. “Has anyone ever told you you’re a sucky friend,” he mumbles miserably.  
  
“Yeah, you. Multiple times,” Jongdae says. He sighs again. “Okay, look. You’re making this so much more complicated than it should be. You guys are, like, all revoltingly BFF-y now, aren’t you? I’m willing to bet he feels the same way, so just tell him how you feel. It’s not difficult. Tell him how you _really_ feel, not all that ‘uh, maybe we should be more than friends so I can sex you up through Skype like the nasty twink I am’ crap.”  
  
Rolling onto his side so he can face Jongdae, Baekhyun rubs at his eyes and clutches one of Jongdae’s teddies to his chest. “Um, okay. Just a slight problem. I’ve kind of been…um, like, avoiding him? Or…something? Maybe? Haha. Oops.”  
  
Jongdae looks at him. And then he pounces on Baekhyun, punching Baekhyun on the chest with each word as he says, “You. Fucking. Idiot. I have never met anyone as stupid as you. And we’re friends with Chanyeol. You. Are. So. Fucking. Stupid.”  
  
“I just! I was scared,” Baekhyun says. “I just thought...maybe if I stayed away for a while, it’d just…go. I didn’t totally ignore him; I just kind of. You know. Gave him half-assed replies and. Yeah. I dunno. I just. I’m stupid.”  
  
“Yeah, you are,” says Jongdae. “Idiot. What are you so scared of? You _like_ him. You couldn’t stop talking about him before. You wanted to have his babies or whatever.”  
  
“That was back then,” Baekhyun says.  
  
“So? What changed?”  
  
And that—that’s what makes Baekhyun think. What _has_ changed? In the beginning, at the root of it all, it was just an admiration. A deep admiration, a deep like. Maybe he’d liked Kyungsoo from the first song because, he wonders, is that really so hard to believe? And the thing that’s changed is…nothing. He still admires Kyungsoo for his singing, that raw emotion and the lilt of his voice that makes Baekhyun’s heart beat, his voice that’s like the breath in Baekhyun’s lungs. He still likes Kyungsoo. Now, he just wants to do more—he wants to hold Kyungsoo’s hand and lace their fingers together on lazy Saturday evenings on the couch in the dim glow of the television playing a movie that neither of them are really watching because Kyungsoo would be so much more interesting, more gorgeous and beautiful with the slight slope of his nose and his lips—they’d be red, Baekhyun thinks, because he would’ve kissed them so much before—and his long lashes and his soft pale skin, illuminated and shadowed by the dips of light. Stripping it down to its bare foundations, Baekhyun realises that nothing has changed. Nothing has changed; he just wants more.  
  
“I’m scared,” Baekhyun says quietly. “I think…maybe I did it because I’m scared of getting hurt. I think that there are so many _what ifs_ that I don’t want to put myself out there, make myself vulnerable. Because it always hurts more when it’s from someone you lov—like.”  
  
Jongdae tugs his ear like a reprimanding mother. “How many times do I have to say it before it’s driven into your thick skull, Baekhyun?” he says. “There are always going to be _what ifs._ Nothing is ever really clear or certain—except for the fact that you like him. What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for the time when everything else will become ‘certain’? When you’re sure you’re not going to get hurt? Because I don’t think that will ever happen. I’ve been friends with you for long enough to know it’s what you always do. You think it’s okay just to avoid things because you don’t want to deal with it, but when push comes to shove, do you know what you do every time? You run away. And honestly, it’s pathetic to see. And yeah, sometimes, things won’t work out, and that’s okay. But sometimes, they will, and that’s even more okay. When things aren’t set in stone, it doesn’t mean you _will_ get hurt. It means you have to try because if you don’t, you never will.”  
  
 _If he isn’t ready now, he’ll never be._  
  
Baekhyun feels kind of sick in his stomach and kind of happy and kind of frightened, all at the same time. Maybe a lot more frightened. But that’s okay, Jongdae had said.  
  
He’s sure he isn’t ready, but, strangely, he thinks he’s as ready as he’ll ever be.


	3. Chapter 3

**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
hey  
are you online???  
oh  
maybe not…..  
anyway when you get this, message me on kakao, asshole  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
you didn’t message me on kakaotalk? is everything ok?  
are you ALIVE  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
heeeEEeeeLLLlllLLLlooooOOOooo?  
*tumbleweed*  
*crickets chirping in the bg*  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
lol i hope im not being annoying…  
maybe ur studying for exams or something? gl if you are :D  
  
  


 

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**[[#40](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%2340)] Chau Chau – Deli Spice**  
[301 views]  
Published 1 hour ago  
xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx [Subscribed]  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
so i guess ur not studying…ur just being an asshole?  
if you’re going to ignore me, i guess you could do a better job of it  >_>  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
……………………………….  
……………………………….  
you know what i hate  
people who claim to be your friend and then never REPLY………..hmm  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
ok i didnt mean that. that was passive-aggressive. sorry.  
i know i’m being hypocritical. i wasn’t exactly a good friend either?  
sorry. because i’m being a dickbag. i’m just. frustrated. i think?  
pls reply?  
if i did something wrong…please tell me what i did wrong…so i can fix it…? or maybe…?  
hello?  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
did you die or smthing? lol. maybe sehuns vegan pizzas killed u?  
msg me i guess…if u ever check ur msgs? lol  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
fuck off chanyeol **@baekyeonisreal**  
: (  
  
  


 

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**[[#41](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%2341)] Green Nocturne – Nell**  
[301 views]  
Published 1 hour ago  
xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx [Subscribed]  
  
“Time made me an adult, but I don’t think it made me strong.”  
  
For those times when things are not certain.  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
“Kyungsoo—is he, um, okay?” Baekhyun asks over the phone, habitually picking the lint off his shirt. He’d called Sehun, unable to stand it any longer. Keeping his hands occupied means he’s stopping himself from doing something stupid, like sending another message to Kyungsoo when Kyungsoo is so painfully obviously ignoring him for some reason or another. Okay, so sure, Baekhyun had been kind of avoiding him for a bit, but it wasn’t like an outright ignorance. Nothing to warrant something as bad as this, anyway, and he was going to apologise if Kyungsoo would’ve replied to his messages.  
  
“Well, he keeps muttering something about fortresses and how he’s an impenetrable one? And then something about Haku—uh, Hakuryu-ing his emotions…or something? It was definitely something about fortresses and emotions and how he’s devoid of them. Or something,” Sehun says. “So I guess he’s just like how he is normally. Why? Is something up?”  
  
“Oh,” says Baekhyun, deflating. So Kyungsoo is ignoring him for no reason. That’s always a nice boost to his ego and definitely not a kick to his heart at all. “He’s just been avoiding me, I think. He hasn’t replied to my messages or anything. I thought he might be busy but I guess I wasn’t really sure.”  
  
“Avoiding you? He’s uploading videos, though, right?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
Sehun makes this sound, like a quiet _Oh,_ and then Baekhyun hears a clatter as he puts down his nail polish. A man after his own heart, truly.  
  
“I think I see what’s happening. I’ll talk to him about it,” says Sehun. When a few moments pass, he adds, carefully, “Maybe you should know: Kyungsoo-hyung has a bad habit of running away when things get too intense. He thinks he’s protecting himself or something.”  
  
“From what?” says Baekhyun.  
  
“Why don’t you ask him?” Sehun says.  
  
But Baekhyun thinks he might already know the answer. Maybe they aren’t so different after all.  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
The awkwardness is so palpable in fuzzy silence that Baekhyun sort of wants to melt into the floor and rearrange his molecular structure to become one with the beige-coloured carpet. Or, like, die. Or both. Whatever. Instead, he’s fidgeting with the loose thread on his T-shirt and trying not to stare at the screen because Kyungsoo’s there, whilst also trying to stare at the screen because Kyungsoo’s there. It’s weird because they’d gotten to the point where they’re comfortable enough to send each other explicit descriptions of Hadoukening various body parts out of tsundere, sexually tense rage and to video-call, and now, it seems like they’re back to the start with neither of them knowing what to say or what to do. It’s so awkward. Especially when Kyungsoo is duct-taped to his desk chair and he’s still trying to, very pointedly, look anywhere but Baekhyun’s face on the screen. This is something that Baekhyun has to do, though. No more running away.  
  
“Um, so,” he begins, his heart clenching a bit when he sees Kyungsoo flinch at the sound of his voice. “Um. I think I should probably say sorry. So, sorry.”  
  
“Yeah,” Kyungsoo mumbles, “me too. Sorry. For being an ass.”  
  
The misery in Kyungsoo’s voice makes Baekhyun feel so guilty for being mad. He feels like the dick now for being angry at Kyungsoo, being angry at something that he had done himself. Running away, avoiding things, being a coward. Maybe there was a time when Baekhyun thought they were completely different, but perhaps they’re both more similar to each other than they think. He can’t blame Kyungsoo for what he had done when he had done the same thing in the first place—granted, Kyungsoo had done it better than him and honestly, there’s a part of him that’s pretty impressed. But the part of him that’s guilty—that’s a way bigger part, and it washes through him like a tide, intensified tenfold when Kyungsoo finally looks at him with big, sad eyes and bites on his lower lip.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Kyungsoo says. “Okay, um, wow, this is harder than I thought it’d be.” He stops again but forces himself not to look away and Baekhyun, more than ever, wishes he were right there with Kyungsoo. “I, um. Just. I was afraid you were starting to not like me anymore.” He laughs nervously, listlessly, and Baekhyun wants to be there. He wants to wrap Kyungsoo in his arms and he wants to tuck Kyungsoo’s head in the crook of his neck and breathe him in until he can’t live without him anymore and he wants to tell Kyungsoo that it’s all right. It’s okay. Everything’s okay. “Stupid, huh? So I guess I tried to distance myself before I could get hurt…I do that a lot, I think. It’s my hamartia. Other than that, I’m perfect.”  
  
The funny thing is, though Kyungsoo is joking about it, Baekhyun disagrees. He doesn’t think Kyungsoo is perfect. Perfect is something that is perhaps too far to reach, too far to strive for, too impossible to think about, to imagine, but he’s realised that he doesn’t want perfect. Perhaps, before, when Baekhyun had put Kyungsoo on a pedestal and worshipped him in his not-gay-porn-not-fantasies, he’d once thought that Kyungsoo was amazing and flawless and all these things Baekhyun has now realised he isn’t. But he doesn’t mean that in a bad way; he just means Kyungsoo is normal. He’s ordinary, and maybe that is amazing in its own right because it means Kyungsoo is real. He isn’t some dream, a character in a fantasy. Not that Baekhyun has fantasies (anymore). And Baekhyun thinks these tiny flaws of Kyungsoo’s, like his short-temper or his habit of threatening to Makankosappo the fuck out of his spleen, are what Baekhyun likes the most about him. He’s human. He’s vulnerable, and Baekhyun wants to—he wants to hug him and protect him and stroke his tropical vegetation-scented hair.  
  
“It’s okay,” Baekhyun says, and when Kyungsoo looks like he’s about to say something else, he interrupts. “Really. It’s okay.”  
  
“I really thought you were mad at me or something…”  
  
“I thought _you_ were mad at me,” Baekhyun says, grinning slightly.  
  
Kyungsoo gives him a half-smile back. “Honestly, I was, for a bit. But mostly, I was mad at myself. I just—can we forget about everything that happened? Go back to normal?”  
  
“Yeah,” says Baekhyun. “I like you better when you’re normal and, y’know, talking to me.”  
  
“Hilarious,” Kyungsoo replies, and when he smiles, properly, Baekhyun’s heart flops in his chest like that time Jongin had bought a pet goldfish and tried to take it for walkies in the park with Kristofferson T.S. Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior. “So we’re really okay?”  
  
“We’re okay, times a million. Super okay. Mega okay. Doubly-super-mega okay.”  
  
A second of quiet, and then, Kyungsoo says, “God, I wish I were with you right now,” and Baekhyun’s pulse races, fingers twisting in his pyjama pants. It’s been a long time since he’s felt like this, so strongly for someone. The drop, the fall, is a tight curl around his ribs and he isn’t stupid or naïve enough to keep pretending he doesn’t know what he’s feeling. He just wishes he would’ve accepted it earlier.  
  
“Yeah?” he says, pushing the words past the lump in his throat.  
  
“Yeah,” says Kyungsoo. “So I could punch you for being such a cheesy fucker.”  
  
Baekhyun exhales and tries not to let the disappointment show on his face. Humour has always been his go-to defence mechanism so he rolls his eyes and says, teasingly, “So romantic. I’m swooning.”  
  
He makes sure to keep his hands clenched in his lap so Kyungsoo can’t see how much they’re shaking.  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
Despite Baekhyun’s constant insistence that he hates Jongdae with all his heart and soul and the entire set of Jongin’s collectible anime panties, they’re actually the closest of the group. Baekhyun has been friends with Jongdae for the longest; they’d roomed together during freshman year and the lack of viable friends-with-benefits candidates meant that Baekhyun had reluctantly allowed Jongdae to badly dance and jazz-hands his way into his life. He only became friends with Chanyeol a few months after when Jongdae had kegged him (in the name of friendship, he had declared as he’d pulled down Baekhyun’s jeans) in the cafeteria and Chanyeol, who had been standing behind him in the queue, had collapsed from laughter and needed oxygen pumped back into his lungs in A&E. Plus, Baekhyun has touched Jongdae’s dick. That is a metaphorical symbol of their everlasting friendship, deeper than Chanyeol’s dick in Zitao’s ass and realer than BaekYeon.  
  
And yeah, Jongdae’s kind of an asshole, but he’s always been there for Baekhyun, during the ups and the downs. He’d even been there for Baekhyun that one time when Baekhyun had cried his eyes out whilst sucking his dick, patting Baekhyun’s shoulder as comfortingly as a person without a soul could. This is the reason why, when Baekhyun decides to confess to Kyungsoo, Jongdae is the very last person that Baekhyun resorts to. Jongin is usually the best at sappy, emotional stuff, but all he’d done was shove all five seasons of _Sakura! D♥ki♥D♥ki! Heart Superstar Cyber☆Girl!!_ into Baekhyun’s unwilling arms, and Chanyeol had been too busy studying for his physics test with Zitao, never mind the fact that he and Zitao are music and dance majors, respectively. Jongdae is obviously shit at relationships, but when all else fails, he is the only hope that Baekhyun has left. Luckily, Baekhyun has a key to Jongdae’s apartment, given to him for Extreme Emergencies or Unannounced Spontaneous Booty Calls.  
  
“I have endless patience and you have a massive HD television with more channels than you have STDs. I am prepared to wait all night,” says Baekhyun with his feet up on the coffee table and one hand dug into the bucket of popcorn he’d requested from Charles the Butler. He makes sure to spray little flecks of buttery popcorn within a five metre radius as he talks for that Popcorn Living Room Aesthetic.  
  
Currently, Jongdae is half-naked and furiously necking with Man in Extremely Ugly Sweater Wait Is That a Puppy in a Teacup Between his Nipples? on the adjacent couch, having seemingly not noticed Baekhyun’s presence (unlikely) or ignoring Baekhyun’s presence (likely). Baekhyun is a bit miffed when he realises that Jongdae has replaced him so quickly, but the opening theme of _Game of Thrones_ blasts from the television and suddenly, he gets an idea.  
  
“Oh my GOD,” he gasps dramatically, “did ***** ***** just DIE?!?! And ****** killed him!!?!? OH MY GOD. Wait, is that *****!?!?! And she’s fucking *****!?!? OH MY GOD!!!!!”  
  
More quickly than Baekhyun has ever seen him move, Jongdae ceases his effort to devour No, Seriously, Your Sweater is So Ugly My Eyes Are Burning, Like, I Don’t Even Know Who You Are But I Already Hate You So Much Guy’s neck and glares at Baekhyun with the intensity of a thousand suns. Baekhyun beams at him and gives him the peace sign.  
  
“I hate you so much,” Jongdae says, tongue peeking out to swipe at his red lips.  
  
Nasty Sweater Dude is looking at Baekhyun curiously. “Jongdae, is this the ex-boyfriend you were talking about?” he asks. He doesn’t look too put-off by it; in fact, he seems to be sizing Baekhyun up. Baekhyun is a little bit scared. He’d rather die than have a threesome with someone who voluntarily wears sweaters with animals in prized china on them.  
  
“Well, ‘boyfriend’ implies a certain degree of emotional intimacy, so”—Jongdae sticks his tongue out and blows a raspberry. “Oh, sorry. Let me introduce you two. Baekhyun, this is Oppa. Oppa, this is Baekhyun.” He’s looking at Holy Shit I Thought It Couldn’t Get Any Worse But I Think Your Sweater Actually Got Uglier in the Past Five Seconds? Man adoringly and Baekhyun has never seen Jongdae look at something that isn’t phallic with such affection. It is physically disgusting.  
  
“Haha you are so _silly_ Jongdae haha,” says I Hate Baekhyun So I’m Going to Permanently Damage his Eyesight with Poorly Purchased Sweaters Oppa. It doesn’t escape Baekhyun’s notice that Sweater Man has a hand squeezing Jongdae’s thigh with no innocent means or end. Baekhyun resists the urge to throw up today’s lunch all over Jongdae’s leather sofa because judging by the blissed-out look on Jongdae’s face, he’s either just creamed his pants or is really happy about Baekhyun visiting. Baekhyun’s willing to bet it isn’t the latter. “I’m Joonmyun. It’s nice to meet you.”  
  
He holds out his other hand. Baekhyun grimaces. “Yeah, I’m not touching that,” he says, and then, to Jongdae, “I need your help.”  
  
“I thought you were cyber-boinky with Kyungsoo now,” Jongdae says, surprised. A second later, he grins. “But I won’t say no to sex.”  
  
“Not that kind of help,” says Baekhyun, frowning.  
  
It takes exactly three seconds for Jongdae to work out what kind of ‘help’ Baekhyun wants and when he does, he laughs so hard Oppa has to run to the bedroom to grab his inhaler. “Oh my god,” Jongdae wheezes, “you haven’t even told him you like him yet. You’re pathetic.”  
  
“It’s not my fault!” Baekhyun says. “There wasn’t the right moment for it! Besides, it’s a bit awkward to bring up in the middle of a conversation, isn’t it? _Uh, hey, not to scare you off or anything but I kind of want to stick my dick up your ass and hold your hand whilst doing it?_ ”  
  
“Took the words right out of my mouth,” Jongdae says. “Okay, so you’re saying you haven’t even seen his cock yet. You haven’t even _talked_ to him about his cock yet?”  
  
“No—“  
  
“Oh my god,” Jongdae says. Oppa holds out the inhaler again in case because Jongdae looks like he’s on the edge of bursting into another fit of laughter. Aside from the fact that he wears morally offensive sweaters, Oppa is clearly a horrible boyfriend because what kind of boyfriend tries to save their asthmatic boyfriend’s life when said asthmatic boyfriend is Jongdae? “What do you guys even talk about? Shoujo anime? Cat videos? The fact that you could be sucking his dick right now but you’re not because you’re a fucking pussy-ass bitch who can’t even confess properly like a normal person?”  
  
“Um,” says Baekhyun, “just stuff.”  
  
Thinking about it, Baekhyun doesn’t even know what they talk about on a daily basis. They’ve gone back to the comfortable conversations and the sporadic homicidal threats, and it’s nice to talk about silly things like the screentones of Ryoma’s hair in Chapter 89 or who the best character is. For reference, Kyungsoo thinks it’s Tono Atsukyo because he’s “relatable” but Baekhyun swears it’s Atobe Keigo because 11/10 would bang. Atobe’s mole exudes sexuality. Every time he uses Atobe Kingdom, Baekhyun is not ashamed to say he gets a tiny bit aroused. It’s these mundane details that Baekhyun likes the most, the ordinary and everyday conversations that have become nuances of Baekhyun’s life. Letting Kyungsoo become to mean so much to him is a big step and he’s…ready for it. He wants Kyungsoo to be his boyfriend, but it’s not the label that matters. It’s that he’s letting someone else become closer to him, become something more, and if he were to do this with anyone in the entire world, he’d pick Kyungsoo. Kyungsoo is different, and at the same time, he’s normal; he’s gorgeous and beautiful in all the ways Baekhyun loves, and that is what makes him so special.  
  
“Riiiiight,” Jongdae says, raising an eyebrow. “So what do you want me to do? Do you want me to call him up pretending to be an overenthusiastic aunt and force him to lie ass-up for you?”  
  
“He’d look much better on his back,” Baekhyun mutters, and then flushes when Jongdae smirks. “Don’t you dare say anything. Please, just tell me how I’m supposed to confess without being awkward and, like, gross so I can leave you two alone to have nasty kinky sex on the couch.” He looks forlornly at the couch. “Oh man, I’ve slept here before. Please don’t have nasty kinky sex on the couch.”  
  
“You are so stupid it’s not even funny anymore,” says Jongdae. He pauses for five seconds, and then continues, “I was wrong; it was funny again for, like, five seconds. Think about it, you dumbass. What do you two spend all day doing?”  
  
“Laughing at Jongin’s misery?”  
  
“Close, but not quite. You serenade each other with cheesy pop songs all the time, transcending the limits of reality through your Wi-Fi connection. If that isn’t a massive hint, I don’t know what is. It’s up to you now. Don’t screw it up. I’m not going to help you anymore because I have necks to eat and cocks to suck.”  
  
As soon as Jongdae finishes and practically jumps onto Oppa, Baekhyun knows exactly what to do. Never in his life has he been so eager to get back home, sprinting out of Jongdae’s apartment and hopping into the old, beat-up car he’d gotten from his brother after his high school graduation. The drive back is excruciatingly slow and when he arrives, he kicks Jongin out and shoves him into Chanyeol’s room, ignoring his weak cries of protest because apparently, there are weird sounds coming from there. A little bit of voyeurism never hurt anyone, Baekhyun thinks, as Jongin lets out a whimper of anguish at Chanyeol and Zitao’s intense, sweaty physics revision session, and returns to his bedroom, not before a quick detour to the kitchen for snacks and honey tea for his throat.  
  
He picks up his mic and headphones resolutely and gets to work.  
  
It takes around six hours to complete everything—learning the song, finding illegal download links of the off-vocal instrumental online, recording and mixing and remastering—but finally, it’s all perfect. He’s tired and his eyes hurt and his throat is hoarse and it’s, like, one am, but when he logs onto Skype, Kyungsoo is still online, probably reading amateur Atobe/Tezuka smut.  
  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
hey!  
ur not sleeping yet?  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
No im reading a 50k imperial pair fic and i hate my life txt it gossip girl xox  
Atobe just confessed but tezuka is all like  
No i dont think were right for each other  
WHY WONT THEY JUST REALISE THEIR LOVE FOR EACH OTHER ALREADY  
Why are you asking though  
Whats up  
You werent online today i thought you died or something  
You just crushed all my hopes and dreams  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
charming as always  
did you see my new upload?? check it out!!! it’s important… ಠ◡ಠ  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
That face looks so sus but ill watch it anyway  
  
  
**I Really Like You – Carly Rae Jepsen (baekhyunee_gg)**  
[301 views]  
Published 10 minutes ago  
baekhyunee_gg  
  
For someone who is really special to me…what do you say:  
a) Yes  
b) a)  
c) b)?  
ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ  
  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
soooo  
what do you think??  
ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ ಠ◡ಠ  
  
  
Baekhyun’s heart is beating so fast he thinks it’ll turn into an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog and fight evil men who resemble eggs.  
  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
What do i think about what  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
the video!!!!!!!!!!  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
You know when you uploaded that epik high cover with your friend i actually thought you might have good music taste  
But it seems i was wrong  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
it’s the SENTIMENT behind the song that counts  
kyungsoo i really  
really  
really  
really  
really  
really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really really  
LIKE YOU.  
do you want me too~  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Do i want you to do what  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
you are Insufferable do kyungsoo  
completely with the mid sentence capitalisation and all  
that is how Insufferable you are  
GO OUT WITH ME  
but like  
actually staying inside on the computer and maybe sending each other cute emojis or something?  
and  
yeah  
GO OUT WITH ME!!!!!!  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Hmmmmmm  
Hold that thought  
Let me think about it first  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
………………………………………  
…………………………………………..  
………………………………………………..  
aside from my so called “horrible” taste in music  
i seem to also have horrible taste in men  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Haha  
Fine  
Ill go out with you  
Moron  
  
  
What Kyungsoo says after that makes Baekhyun smile, his chest bursting from happiness, and he doesn’t think he stops smiling, even when he wakes up in the morning:  
  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Dont get the wrong idea  
This doesnt mean i like you or anything  
Ok  
I still want to punch your spleen  
Like really  
Im imagining that im punching your spleen right now  
Haha does it hurt  
Ok  
Wait did you leave  
Come back  
Not that i want you to or anything  
I DONT LIKE YOU  
Ok maybe i like you a little bit but dont flatter yourself  
For like two seconds but then i want to punch you again ok  
…..  
Shut up im going to bed GOODNIGHT.  
…  
♡  
(Shut up)  
I still hate you  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
**Want U – Junggigo (baekhyunee_gg)**  
[301 views]  
Published 1 hour ago  
baekhyunee_gg  
  
Special thanks to my friend Chanyeol (NOT BOYFRIEND, LIKE REALLY GUYS. HE IS REALLY NOT MY BOYFRIEND. I WOULD NEVER LET HIM STICK HIS—um never mind HE’S JUST NOT MY BOYFRIEND OK) for collaborating with me! Check out his Soundcloud in the link below! (Or don’t. His ego is big enough already tbhhhhgygdrhashdchhc CHANYEOL IS THE BEStdfoiihh jhkbf rdhjui hjcd opjkh fn  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
**[[#42](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%2342)] I Got a Boy – Girls’ Generation**  
[78,009 views]  
Published 2 days ago  
xXxsuperultragreatdeliciousmountainstormxXx [Subscribed]  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
“Okay,” says Chanyeol, looking at Baekhyun suspiciously, “can someone explain to me why Baekhyun’s been grinning down at his phone all day like a dopey nugget? I’ve never seen him this happy since the day he’d discovered Kim Taeyeon on his Youtube recommended videos.”  
  
It’s two in the afternoon; the last of the lunch rush-hour customers are filtering out so they’re all crowded around a small table at the back because apparently, there literally isn’t anything else to do on a Saturday afternoon except go to the quaint little coffee shop, Love Love Love, near the apartment and pretty much Be the Fanfiction Cliché.  
  
“I’ve not been staring at my phone all day,” Baekhyun mutters back absentmindedly, chewing on his thumbnail as he very pointedly stares at his phone. He’s talking to Kyungsoo on Kakao about nothing in particular, really, but it’s these conversations he likes the most. The mundane conversations, the how-are-yous and the I-miss-yous and I-want-to-be-with-you-not-because-I-like-you-or-anything-I-just-want-to-punch-yous. Talking to Kyungsoo like this makes him happy. Kyungsoo makes him happy. It’s something he’s still getting used to, this pull, heat, in his stomach whenever he sees Kyungsoo’s face over Skype, and the lightheaded dizziness when Kyungsoo talks to him. There are parts that are familiar, the half-hearted threats and the silly arguments over Is Atobe’s Mole Real or Did He Get Anime Plastic Surgery? and there are moments that are thrilling and new, like when he doesn’t have to preface his kisses with ‘no homo’ and Kyungsoo doesn’t yell at him for jerking off over Skype because he’s doing it too. The new parts are scary and exciting and wonderful and he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to get used to them because that, he thinks, is what makes this worth it. It’s what makes it worth being with Kyungsoo.  
  
“He says as he doesn’t even look up to reply to me,” Chanyeol says amused, and Zitao pauses in his quest to take an Instagram photo of his Starbucks coffee cup at the perfect angle and lighting to laugh at Chanyeol’s joke. Their relationship is so weird; they’d met each other through Yixing, a mutual friend who’s in Zitao’s major and occasionally has jam sessions with Chanyeol, and at first, they’d hated each other. Zitao knew Yixing ‘biblically,’ he’d said, and Chanyeol is just ridiculously possessive over his friends. It kind of makes sense that they always have disgustingly kinky antagonistic sex, but then, about once in a million centuries, they’ll do something cute together and scar Baekhyun for the rest of eternity. Baekhyun shudders in his seat.  
  
Jongin, who hasn’t been paying much attention as he probably spams Sehun with more dog memes (it’s sad that he’s sending them in the first place, but Baekhyun does not expect much from a man who only follows ‘everydaynarutomeme’ and ‘dailydogs’ on Tumblr), offhandedly remarks, “He’s probably texting his boyfriend.”  
  
Chanyeol stops. “What,” he says.  
  
“What,” says Jongdae because he’s Jongdae and he does things like that.  
  
“What,” says Zitao, just to conform even though he doesn’t really care.  
  
“Okay, new question: Can someone explain to me why Baekhyun has a boyfriend and no one bothered to tell me?” Chanyeol says, looking mildly angry, but mostly intrigued at the prospect of having someone to play 2v2 against in Mario Kart because Jongin sucks balls, both in the metaphorical Italian plumber riding unrealistic motorised contraption sense and the literal sense.  
  
“I knew and I’ve had, like, two lines in this fic,” Zitao says.  
  
“Shut up, Zitao,” says Chanyeol, and Baekhyun swears the look that flashes in Zitao’s eyes is arousal. Gross. “Can someone who isn’t Zitao explain to me why Baekhyun has a boyfriend and no one bothered to tell me?”  
  
“Uh, maybe if you took your cock out of Zitao’s ass for long enough to socialise with us, you would know that Baekhyun is currently sexing up an allegedly cute boy over the internet in the so-called sexually tense Arial font,” Jongdae says. He throws his hands up in the air. “Wow! Mystery solved! Applause!”  
  
“This is a terrible betrayal of my trust, Baekhyun!” Chanyeol says, shaking Baekhyun’s shoulders to express the terribleness of his betrayal. “Treason to the highest degree!”  
  
“Don’t get too worked up over it,” says Jongdae. “They don’t even talk about anything good. They don’t even talk about dicks. I bet their relationship is repulsively vanilla. Have you even tried cock rings yet?”  
  
“Jongdae-hyung has a point,” Jongin says thoughtfully as Zitao perks up at the mention of cock rings and lapses into a conversation with Jongdae about the new exclusive, special edition cock ring collection on the sketchy, history-erasing websites people like him and Jongdae go on. “What _do_ you guys talk about?”  
  
Baekhyun thinks about their dumb conversations, the soft and hushed _I like yous_ over the static in the darkness of his room, and the constant back-and-forth exchange of songs, singing what they’re not ready to tell each other, not yet. He thinks about the time Kyungsoo had gotten personally offended that Baekhyun thought there was satanic sacrifice in _The Lion King_ and had forced him to watch it online, laughing when Baekhyun had burst into tears at Mufasa’s death. He thinks about the times when Kyungsoo makes him feel like he’s falling and floating simultaneously, when Kyungsoo makes him unfamiliar in himself and, at the same time, right, and he realises that these times are too many to count. Too many to tell, and he doesn’t want to. He wants to keep them close to his heart, like their little secret.  
  
“Nothing much,” Baekhyun finally answers, and Chanyeol rolls his eyes disbelievingly, though he doesn’t push it any further.  
  
The light on Baekhyun’s phone flashes, signalling a new message, and Baekhyun can’t help the smile that spreads across his face.  
  
  


 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Hey  
Stop touching your dick for like five seconds i have something to tell you  
Ask you  
Whatever  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
I WASNT TOUCHING MY DICK  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Ok why is your status set to ‘do not disturb’ then  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
…………..  
…………….  
…………………..  
what was it you wanted to ask me????  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Lol idiot  
Ok so like?  
You know jongin is coming up to visit sehun next week or something right  
And  
Uh  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
I WAS WATCHING A DRAMA  
ON FULL SCREEN  
ok carry on  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
You really are a moron did you know that  
Anyway  
So like? maybe? i was wondering?  
Like? maybe i could come down to visit you? or something?  
I mean not because i want to or anything its just going to be gross and squelchy if jongin and sehun are together and also i just want to punch you in the spleen or something?  
Or whatever  
Hello? did you leave  
Are you touching your dick again  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
oh my god  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
But i mean only if you me to or  
Idk???? just  
  
**stop changing my screenname chanyeol**  
Hello?  
Hyung, this is Jongin!  
Baekhyun-hyung is currently having like…a full-bodied seizure on the floor or something…he’s frothing at the mouth?  
I guess that’s just how he shows his happingjgfjflghj j yh y u u hcfxgczfds  
JONGIN GET OUT don’t put ur plebeian fingers on my macbook u have like 8 play on ur own  
also  
YES  
I WOULD BE HONOURED TO HAVE YOU COME VISIT ME  
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH  
IM SO EXCITED IM GOING TO PEE  
metaphorically  
  
**Kyungsoo**  
Youre an idiot  
…  
But im really excited to meet you too  
Just so i can punch your spleen  
Dont get the wrong idea…!!!!!


	4. Chapter 4

Of course, out of all days, today just _has_ to be the day that everything goes wrong.  
  
Baekhyun is running ten minutes late; last night, he’d stayed up in his bed, intermittently throwing off his covers in frustration and checking his phone every five minutes because he had been too nervous to sleep, and now that it has come to the day when he’s actually going meet to Kyungsoo, everything is going wrong. He’s in too much of a panic to consider maybe that’s a tiny exaggeration—without Chanyeol (kicked out and currently crashing at Jongdae’s place) or Jongin (visiting Sehun) to wake him up and the lack of sleep he’d gotten, he’d opened his window and tossed his alarm clock across the street onto his exhibitionist neighbour’s balcony. Unfortunately, whilst this meant he’d managed to catch a few more hours of shut-eye until late afternoon, it also meant he’d woken up, screamed for about ten minutes straight, pulled his curtains shut because String Bean Body, String Bean Dick Neighbour was flashing again, and hurriedly pulled on an old sweater before sprinting out to his car and hightailing it to the train station where Kyungsoo’s supposed to be arriving any minute now.  
  
He’d been taken by surprise when Kyungsoo had asked him a few weeks ago if he could come and visit and Baekhyun doesn’t think he could’ve said ‘yes’ enough. He’s finally meeting Kyungsoo; he’s finally going to see and touch Kyungsoo in person. Kyungsoo isn’t going to be a blur of pixels on his screen in 480p. He’s going to be real and everything Baekhyun has ever wanted will be right there, right in front of him. Half of the nausea in Baekhyun’s stomach is excitement and anticipation; the other half is worry. There’s a part of him that wonders what will happen if he fucks this up because almost inevitably, he’s going to do something stupid like talk about Chanyeol’s sex habits or tell Kyungsoo how glad he is that his parents didn’t use a condom, but by the time he pulls into the station and parks his car, slightly drenched by the rain, the anxiety dissipates and he realises all he wants to do is meet Kyungsoo.  
  
“Hey, sorry, I’m here,” he says, panting slightly from running into the mass of people at the station as he calls Kyungsoo on his phone. “Have you arrived yet?”  
  
“Yeah, I’m coming out—“  
  
The voice suddenly cuts off and Baekhyun doesn’t even have time to wonder if something’s happened when something— _someone_ —barrels into his chest and throws their arms around his shoulders. He feels Kyungsoo before he sees him; it doesn’t quite register that Kyungsoo is here, actually here and in his arms, fitting so easily into the nooks and curves of Baekhyun’s body, until Kyungsoo buries his face in Baekhyun’s neck and peers up through his lashes. His breath his light and warm on Baekhyun’s cold, wet skin, and the crown of his hair tickles Baekhyun’s chin. Baekhyun is startled for a moment, and then he brings his arms around Kyungsoo’s waist and smiles.  
  
“Hi,” he says.  
  
“Shut up for a second,” Kyungsoo mumbles. His voice sounds so much better without the buzz of his shitty mic or connection lag, and Baekhyun can hear the whine in his voice that’s so endearing. Riling Kyungsoo up has become one of his favourite pastimes recently; Kyungsoo has a short fuse and Baekhyun enjoys pissing him off, just to hear him get all squeaky and angry because it’s so cute. “Just—just shut up for a second, I’m enjoying this.”  
  
There are certain moments in life where Baekhyun wants to stop and stay like that forever. Take a picture, imprint it in his mind, breathe in every sight and smell and sound, and this is one of those moments. Baekhyun can feel the weight of Kyungsoo’s body against his, sturdy though the crowd around them that is jostling and moving past, and he feels like no one else matters. Kyungsoo’s hair smells like coconuts, just like Baekhyun had imagined, and his lips are so much softer than they look as he tips his head up and lets Baekhyun press their mouths together, chastely. It’s everything and nothing like Baekhyun thought it’d be. Kyungsoo’s mouth is warm and a comfort against his lips and though he tastes like coffee, to Baekhyun, it’s sweet; though Baekhyun’s imagined this for so long, yearning to touch and to kiss and to maybe just be with Kyungsoo in a way that fuzzy images on his computer screen can’t bring, it’s immensely better than he’d thought it’d be. Suddenly, he is hyperaware of the smallest, insignificant details: the slight itch of Kyungsoo’s sweater on his skin and Kyungsoo’s fingers pressing against the nape of his neck, making him shiver, and the way Kyungsoo kisses, hesitant and innocent until Baekhyun pulls away and looks at him with a fondness he didn’t know was possible. There are probably a million ways to describe how he feels right now: He wants the seconds to stop; he doesn’t want to lose them because he wants to live in this moment, hold onto this memory for as long as he can.  
  
“Um,” says Kyungsoo. He’s biting his lower lip, suppressing a smile, but it still shines through. “Hi. I guess. Whatever.”  
  
“Hi,” says Baekhyun. He touches Kyungsoo’s hand and feels an incomprehensible surge of adoration in his gut, like summer rushing through his body all at once. “Should we go home?”  
  
Kyungsoo nods.  
  
There is nothing else left to say. There is nothing else they need to say.  
  
The ride home is spent in a lull, a daze of raindrops pattering against the window and soft Girls’ Generation ballads drifting from the speakers. More than once, Baekhyun catches Kyungsoo staring at him and each time, Kyungsoo flushes red to his ears and quickly glances away, a scowl on his face, but Baekhyun thinks it’s adorable. He can’t stop staring at Kyungsoo either, which is probably not a good idea whilst driving; Kyungsoo is dressed simply, in a fluffy parka to face the spring chill and a black sweater and jeans, and Baekhyun feels, quite frankly, like a gross, college boy in his ratty Gotta Catch ‘Em All shirt. Kyungsoo is so…perfect, Baekhyun is tempted to say, compared to him; his skin is pale and smooth and his eyes are pretty, even when they’re squinted and shooting glares in Baekhyun’s direction because _quit staring at me, you—s-shut up, just look at the road or something, I’m too young to die from your shitty driving._ They’ve only been together for around twenty minutes and Kyungsoo’s threatened to kick his balls so far up his body that they’ll become boobs (probably not physically possible but Baekhyun doesn’t want to find out) three times and told him to shut up approximately eight hundred, and Baekhyun is so in love right now. Maybe that isn’t entirely true—maybe not just ‘right now,’ but maybe he’s been in love with Kyungsoo ever since the first video. Ever since their first conversation, ever since their first call and Kyungsoo had asked if Baekhyun were really in college because he sounded like a prepubescent girl, ever since their first video call. Maybe it’d been some time after that; it’s all blurred and when the adoration had tipped into something more isn’t clear to Baekhyun, but he’s glad that it did.  
  
“I bet I’m not what you were expecting, huh?” Kyungsoo says, suddenly, and Baekhyun hits the brake at the red traffic light, taking the moment to glance over at Kyungsoo.  
  
Soft-skinned, full-lipped, pale and beautiful. Infinitely, unimaginably better.  
  
“No,” Baekhyun says. “I thought you’d be taller.”  
  
Kyungsoo opens his mouth, and then closes it and decides to punch Baekhyun on the arm instead.  
  
“It’ll be the spleen next time,” he mutters. “Watch your back.”  
  
Baekhyun grins.  
  
The traffic isn’t too bad so they arrive back relatively quickly and Baekhyun offers to carry Kyungsoo’s bag up the three flights of stairs because their elevator’s broken and Kyungsoo looks like death from his journey here. As Kyungsoo hands over his bag, a black canvas backpack, their fingers brush against each other and Kyungsoo pulls away like it’s electric. Baekhyun glimpses something scribbled on the back of Kyungsoo’s hand. _Dont forget the toothbrush even though youll probably forget the toothbrush,_ it says, and Baekhyun beams at Kyungsoo when Kyungsoo looks at him guiltily for flinching.  
  
“I’m just—“ Kyungsoo begins, and Baekhyun’s noticed that Kyungsoo is, generally, a very twitchy, pointy kind of person, even as he walks up the stairs, at first taking two steps, and then one each time. It’s weirdly cute. Baekhyun seems to be finding everything about Kyungsoo cute today.  
  
“It’s okay,” says Baekhyun. He touches Kyungsoo’s hand gently and this time, Kyungsoo doesn’t pull away. Instead, he laces their fingers together, albeit hesitantly, and presses their palms together. “So, did you remember to bring your toothbrush?”  
  
“…..” Kyungsoo frowns. “Dammit,” he says, and on reflex, “I hate you.”  
  
“Of course you do,” says Baekhyun. “We have spare toothbrushes. Still hate me now?”  
  
“You’re acceptable,” says Kyungsoo, and Baekhyun knows that’s as close to _I like you_ as Kyungsoo can bring himself to say in his own strange way.  
  
They’ve finally reached the apartment and Baekhyun rummages in his pockets for his keys. Fluff. Gum. Instant ramen flavouring. Phone. Condom. Lube packet. Empty lube packet. Vitamins. Keys. He jangles them triumphantly and twists them in the lock, Kyungsoo rolling his eyes as he follows Baekhyun into the apartment.  
  
“Um,” says Kyungsoo. “Wow.”  
  
Oh yeah. Only now does Baekhyun remember the reason why he’d set an alarm to wake him early—he was supposed to clean the apartment. There’s shit literally everywhere. Metaphorical shit, literally everywhere. There are old clothes strewn over the sofas, papers and textbooks and screwed up compositions scattered over the floor, a very questionable bowl of…a Thing on the kitchen table, and Chanyeol’s fucking amp cables tangled up on every inch Chanyeol’s found to leave them in. Oops. It’s not exactly gross or unclean, per se, it’s simply messy, and it’s a miracle that they can even make their way into the lounge through the labyrinth of metaphorical faecal matter, clearing a small space in front of the sofa where they can squish themselves next to each other. Baekhyun dumps Kyungsoo’s bag unceremoniously onto the couch behind them and faces to Kyungsoo, about to ask him what he wants to do, when he catches Kyungsoo gaping at something.  
  
“Um,” Kyungsoo says, not for the first time today, “why is there a massive tarp in the middle of your living room?”  
  
Baekhyun is not proud to say that a few days ago, they had just gotten sick of the mess and Chanyeol had bought a tarp to throw over a small pile in the centre of the room. They’d pushed the responsibility of cleaning it onto Jongin, who’d said he would, but evidently, he hasn’t done a very good job. What is under the tarp is something that Baekhyun would like to keep a secret. He doesn’t want Kyungsoo to be traumatised in the same way he was.  
  
“It’s not a massive tarp,” says Baekhyun. “It’s a moderately sized tarp.”  
  
“Okay, why is there a moderately sized tarp in the middle of your living room?”  
  
“It’s for aesthetic purposes,” Baekhyun says, “but for your own piece of mind, I wouldn’t recommend looking underneath there. Just sayin’.”  
  
“I think I saw something move underneath there,” says Kyungsoo. “I’ll take your word for it.” He turns back to Baekhyun and jerks back a little, startled at the close proximity between them. A slight awkwardness is to be expected, especially since they’re meeting properly for the first time and Kyungsoo is an awkward little nugget, and Baekhyun is more surprised when Kyungsoo reaches out to push back a wet strand of hair stuck to Baekhyun’s forehead from the weather outside. He doesn’t notice he’s blushing or staring with his mouth half-open until Kyungsoo gives him a weird look and he schools his face into a mask of sexy, aloof indifference, befit of a cherry blossom tree. “Maybe you should get changed or something because you might catch a cold—not that I care or anything. I really don’t. I just. Shut up.”  
  
Baekhyun doesn’t want to leave Kyungsoo’s side, but the thought of being with Kyungsoo for the next week or so is infinitely more appealing than being stuck in bed whilst his shitty immune system Wrecks Shit Up, so he quickly scurries to the bedroom and changes into a comfortable T-shirt and dries his hair with Chanyeol’s Hello Kitty hairdryer.  
  
“Hey, Kyungsoo,” Baekhyun calls as he walks out, ruffling up his hair so it looks all fluffy and shiny and irresistible, I didn’t really make any plans for dinner, so do you wanna go out or—“  
  
Kyungsoo looks up at him, the corner of the tarp lifted up in his hand. “Um,” he says. “Heh?”  
  
This is exactly what Baekhyun had wanted to avoid. Calmly, he walks over and covers Jongin’s anime body pillow orgy back up with the tarp. “We shall never speak of this again. Now then, dinner?”  
  
In the end, they decide to order takeout because Baekhyun’s cheap and he can’t cook and he doesn’t want to force Kyungsoo to, and it feels cosy like this, squashed up against each other in front of the sofa watching television. For once, he’s quite glad that they’ve never changed the crappy lighting in the living room because the dim glow drenches itself over Kyungsoo’s face in soft shadows, dipping where it should and casting gold on his skin where it doesn’t. He doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to stop staring at Kyungsoo, doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to get enough because Kyungsoo is just—it’s overwhelming, this feeling, to like someone _so_ much, and he can’t help himself when he shuffles closer. There is a space between them, almost imperceptible, but still there, as if neither of them dare to breach the delicate boundary between them, so Baekhyun presses himself into it. Their knees knock together and Baekhyun’s hand falls between them, their fingers interlocking on instinct, and it grabs Kyungsoo’s attention from the documentary playing on the screen.  
  
He looks at Baekhyun with wide eyes and all Baekhyun can think of is how much he’s in love.  
  
“What,” says Kyungsoo, kind of breathlessly, and his voice is like a tide that sweeps Baekhyun away.  
  
Baekhyun gives him a half-lopsided smile and answers, “You.”  
  
The next few seconds occur vividly; Baekhyun is on his knees, bracketing Kyungsoo’s thighs, and it’s natural, how they lean into each other. In Kyungsoo’s eyes, Baekhyun can see a tiny bit of fear, not unlike the trembling he’s feeling on his own skin, but he can also see anticipation and adoration and everything Kyungsoo can’t say with words, and this is what gives him the courage to press their mouths together, his hand curling around Kyungsoo’s jaw. Kyungsoo squeezes his other hand where their fingers are laced together and Baekhyun wants to feel every inch of Kyungsoo. He wants to touch Kyungsoo’s skin with his fingertips, to fill his memories with Kyungsoo so real and pliant under him, because a small part of him still can’t believe Kyungsoo is here.  
  
Kyungsoo hesitates for a second and a wave of _Oh god, I've fucked up,_ washes through Baekhyun because Kyungsoo isn't kissing back and he makes to pull away, but Kyungsoo places his hand on the back of Baekhyun's neck and presses his mouth to Baekhyun's curved lips, closing his eyes. He is pliant and eager beneath Baekhyun; Baekhyun leads and he responds just as well. His kissing is a bit sloppy but Baekhyun's always like the imperfect, and Kyungsoo’s lips are so soft against his that he wants to melt into Kyungsoo's body forever. Kyungsoo’s kissing is intoxicating, addictive. His lashes flutter against the freckles on his cheeks as he melts into the kiss, Baekhyun nipping playfully at his thick lower lip, and Baekhyun forces himself to keep his own eyes open. He wants to watch Kyungsoo; he wants to watch as he licks at the pretty heart of Kyungsoo’s mouth and coaxes it open, and he wants to watch Kyungsoo become wrecked and ruined, beautifully like Baekhyun knows he’ll be, so he can be the one to put Kyungsoo back together. He wants to make this kiss, their second kiss but no less desirous, unforgettable. He wants to etch himself into Kyungsoo’s mind in the same way that Kyungsoo ghosts in his and he wants to be the only one worthy of being in Kyungsoo’s heart. He wants Kyungsoo.  
  
Baekhyun has never been a particularly patient person but today, he wants to take things slow. He wants to savour this so he starts off chaste until the warmth of Kyungsoo’s parted lips is too much of a temptation and he slides his tongue in, licking at Kyungsoo’s teeth and the roof of his mouth. Their kisses become more heated, periodically pulling away, only to be drawn back to each other, and Kyungsoo makes a small sound like a moan in his throat, pressing his fingers into the dips of Baekhyun’s knuckles. Baekhyun feels the vibrations all the way to his fingertips, stroking the sensitive spot behind Kyungsoo’s ear that makes him shiver, and he wants Kyungsoo so much that he wonders when it’ll tip over the precipice into ‘need.’  
  
When Kyungsoo’s hips grind against his, lifting off the ground, Baekhyun can feel his cock through his pants, semi-hard. Kyungsoo lets out an embarrassed noise, which soon turns into soft moans as Baekhyun moulds his fingers over Kyungsoo’s erection, pushing his palm against it. He knows what Kyungsoo’s dick looks like; it was probably inevitable that they would end up jerking off to each other over Skype anyway, given Baekhyun’s inner horny teenage boy and Kyungsoo, who likes to pretend to put up a fight but eventually submits to Baekhyun’s whims. Almost certainly, he knows it’ll be even nicer in real life, hot beneath his fingers, and breaks away from their kisses, stuttering with bites and sucks. Baekhyun has something he wants to ask, but the request dies in his mouth when the Kyungsoo’s shiny, spit-slicked mouth catches the light, all red and swollen from Baekhyun, and his eyes are dilated and dark and Baekhyun knows he’s never seen anyone so beautiful before. It’s terrifying, in all the right ways.  
  
“Can I?” Baekhyun asks, and a slight nod from Kyungsoo is all he needs.  
  
He doesn’t unzip Kyungsoo’s pants, but instead, trails his hand up and under the hem of Kyungsoo’s shirt. Kyungsoo’s stomach is a stark contrast from the sharp juts of his hips, soft and warm, and Baekhyun takes his time to slowly feather his fingers across Kyungsoo’s skin, revelling in the shudder that runs through Kyungsoo’s body. Kyungsoo is so sensitive; Baekhyun loves how he can draw out these delicious sounds from Kyungsoo’s kiss-bruised lips as he tips his head back in pleasure, and god, he’ll say this a million times, but there’s a hot curl in his gut and he loses himself, breath caught in his throat and—  
  
“WOOF.”  
  
“Oh my fucking god,” Baekhyun groans, wiping his cherry-stained lips with the back of his hand as Kyungsoo jolts back in surprise.  
  
Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior yips loudly, padding out of the bathroom in the black spike-studded booties Jongin had knitted for him, and Baekhyun swears the look on his face is, like, the dog version of a smug, self-satisfied fucking _smirk._ Hanging around Chanyeol must’ve somehow osmosed asshole vibes into Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’s zen because he totally disregards the whole atmosphere—the turned-down lights, the sexual tension in the air, and Kyungsoo being cute and flustered—and nudges Baekhyun’s leg with his nose. The look in his black, soulless eyes says, _Food._ He should be so lucky that he’s cute.  
  
“This is my stupid dog,” Baekhyun explains, exasperatedly climbing off Kyungsoo and returning to his original place. Kyungsoo looks midway to becoming a hot mess and Baekhyun is no longer a calm cherry blossom tree, swaying in the cool breeze. He is an angry cherry blossom tree, swaying in a sexually-frustrated breeze. Ugh. “He’s called Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior. For future reference, I wasn’t the one who picked the name.”  
  
“Hi Kris,” says Kyungsoo, holding out his hand tentatively. Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior regards him with haughty derision and turns his nose away.  
  
“Uh, yeah, he’s kind of an ass. He doesn’t respond to anything other than ‘Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’ and only eats the highest quality steak and caviar. We imagine him to be a very sophisticated American socialite trapped in the body of a hypoallergenic poodle-Pomeranian crossbreed.”  
  
Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior snaps his gaze to Baekhyun and attempts to chomp Baekhyun’s big toe, sticking out of his holey sock. Baekhyun harnesses all the power of the calmest tree in the world and embodies it in his presence, taking a deep breath. He blames Jongin for all of this. He doesn’t know why it’s Jongin’s fault. It just is.  
  
“Sorry, we imagine him to be a very sophisticated _Canadian_ socialite trapped in the body of a hypoallergenic poodle-Pomeranian crossbreed. There’s a difference.” _Apparently, eh?_ he adds under his breath, but Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior ignores him and sniffs at Kyungsoo’s palm before deciding he approves, elegantly hopping onto Kyungsoo’s lap and curling up with his head by Kyungsoo’s crotch. One expectant look later, Baekhyun is stomping his way to the kitchen as Kyungsoo pats Kristofferson T.S Michael Taeyeon Sasuke the Third (III) Senior’s head, furiously wondering how his dumb puppy has gotten closer to Kyungsoo’s dick than he ever has.

 

♪ ♫ ♪

  
  
  
  
When Baekhyun wakes up to the smell of pancakes and maple syrup wafting into his bedroom, immediately, he knows something’s different. He has never woken up to something that smells actually edible before and his first thought is _serial killer._ Strangely thoughtful serial killer who is concerned about his health and will fatten him up, farm-style, before harvesting his guts to sell on the black market. His second thought is: Kyungsoo. But isn’t Kyungsoo two cities over…? Probably sending him mental death threats whilst rewatching his favourite episode of Prince of Tennis? Whilst bullying Sehun? But wait…isn’t Jongin there too? And if Jongin is there, then Kyungsoo must be here. And if Kyungsoo is here…  
  
Baekhyun’s brain suddenly kickstarts into action. Kyungsoo is _here._ Holy shit. And he’s slept in when he could’ve been having sexy boinky times and shoving his relationship all up in Jongdae’s business!!!! Thoroughly angry with himself, he smushes his face into the pillow for twenty seconds and lets out a muffled yell. Weird. The pillow smells like coconuts. Kyungsoo’s hair also smells like coconuts. He’s beginning to remember what had happened last night. Cuddling. Intense cuddling with the passion of a million suns. Sexually tense cuddling as Baekhyun had cupped Kyungsoo’s nape and let their mouths fall together sleepily, his leg wedged between the heat of Kyungsoo’s thighs and their bodies pressed together into the impossible space in the middle. What was supposed to happen was that they were supposed to wake up together in the morning light and snuggle and maybe he would suck Kyungsoo’s dick a little bit, but instead, here he is, alone and cold with no pale, milky thighs to warm him up. This is an abomination, he thinks, and then leaps up and into the bathroom to wash up, making himself presentable so he can begin his quest to find said pale, milky thighs to worship.  
  
He finds Kyungsoo in the kitchen by the cooker, catching Kyungsoo’s eye as he turns around in Baekhyun’s direction to grab something from the fridge. It’s a bag of milk, which he almost drops in surprise, but manages to grab in time before it hits the floor, and he stutters out, “Um, sorry, I just. Wanted to say thank you for letting me stay so I thought I’d make breakfast or something, but. Um. This doesn’t mean I like you, okay! Jongin told me you hate cucumbers, so I made them all cucumber flavoured! Ha. How does that make you feel—wait. Not that I asked Jongin or anything, okay? Shut up.”  
  
Baekhyun couldn’t care less about cucumber-flavoured pancakes or milk theft right now. He has so much he wants to say; Kyungsoo looks goddamn beautiful in the backlight of the sun, bathed in gold and radiant and slightly confused because Baekhyun has been staring at him for, like, two minutes in silence, and Baekhyun wants to say so much to him. _I like you, so much. You make everything so much better. I want to hold your hand. I want to kiss you. I want to wake up next to you in the morning, every morning, and fall asleep next you at night. I want you to be the last thing I see, I want you to be the first thing I see, I want to touch you and make you mine. I want you. I like you._  
  
For his entire life, he’s been told to shut up so many times, but for the first time in his life, he’s speechless.  
  
The feeling doesn’t subside, but it simmers, and snapping out his reverie when Kyungsoo turns, he moves forward and asks Kyungsoo curiously, “You can cook?”  
  
“I told you before,” Kyungsoo says, and sets the milk on the kitchen counter to flip his pancakes, looking at the pan sheepishly and holding down a blush. “I can cook a little. It’s more of an interest than anything, like looking at blogs and stuff. I can only do the basics though. I’m not an expert or anythi—mmmph!”  
  
Baekhyun is stumbling forward before his brain reacts, pushing Kyungsoo back until he hits the edge of the counter and curling an arm around Kyungsoo’s waist to hold him steady. Kyungsoo is so hot. He has domestic skills and looks this weird mix of sexy, cute and downright fuckable in his oversized T-shirt and no pants, just underwear—oh god, NO PANTS—and Baekhyun is so in love. Ridiculously, irrevocably, completely drowning in love. He presses their lips together, softly, and when Kyungsoo gets over the initial shock of Baehyun’s spontaneity, he relaxes and melts into the sunlight between them, burying a hand in Baekhyun’s messy morning hair. Kyungsoo’s mouth is as warm as Baekhyun remembers, wonders if it’ll ever be anything less, and knows he’d want it if it were anything more, and god, he’s so in love. He’s so in love with Kyungsoo. He feels like an explosion, a supernova, like he’s feeling everything at once, and something greater than adoration, greater than like, settles in his gut. Love.  
  
“I am seriously in love with you,” Baekhyun says solemnly when Kyungsoo pulls away, slightly out of breath with red lips matching the pink flush on his cheeks. “Like, actually seriously in love with you. Please marry me. In, like, a normal non-creepy-even-though-we-just-met-kind-of?, non-eternal-till-death-do-us-part-under-the-oath-of-the-minister-a-company-of-approximately-one-hundred-guests-depending-on-our-financial-stability-and-how-big-the-ceremony-is way. Or, uh, insert something non-creepy and non-weird here.”  
  
“Baekhyun,” says Kyungsoo quietly.  
  
“Yes,” says Baekhyun.  
  
“My pancakes are burning.”  
  
A minute of staring at each other, and then Baekhyun slides his arm out from behind Kyungsoo, sneaking a quick kiss to the corner of his mouth, and silently takes a seat at the kitchen table as Kyungsoo performs some snazzy kung-fu pancake flipping with his hands. After being so preoccupied yesterday, Baekhyun hasn’t had a chance to check his messages, and he finds one from the group chat all his friends are in, probably saying something generally degrading and insulting.  
  
  
**IF THERE’S A ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE, WE EAT JONGIN FIRST (believe it)**  
[6 members: se_ehun; Zitaozi; Chan-dizzle; Tenth Hokage; chanyeol stinks like shit; Daddy]  
  
**Chan-dizzle**  
how did it go  
  
**chanyeol stinks like shit**  
in less than 24hrs ive alr told him that i love him and offered a marriage proposal  
so pretty well i think  
  
**se_ehun**  
Good job  
  
**Zitaozi**  
Well done  
  
**se_ehun**  
Congrats on your wedding  
  
**Zitaozi**  
Slow applause  
  
**Daddy**  
I CALL DIBS ON BEST MAN  
  
**Tenth Hokage**  
Have you guys actually met Kyungsoo-hyung yet? Why don’t you introduce him, Baek-hyung?  
  
**chanyeol stinks like shit**  
jongin no  
JONGIN  
NO.  
have you NOT MET our friends  
NEW TOPIC  
  
**Chan-dizzle**  
oh my god we should totally meet him  
Kyungsoo  
aw  
what an adorable name  
I bet he’s like five ft tall  
  
**chanyeol stinks like shit**  
NEW TOPIC: why is chanyeol staying at jongdae’s apartment when his boyfriend, who is not jongdae, also has an apartment??  
infidelity in the ranks? GASP. scandalous!  
and now  
discuss.  
  
**Chan-dizzle**  
everyone knows its because zitaos house smells like fucking POTPURRI  
and dog piss  
don’t forget the dog piss  
NEW TOPIC: let’s meet baekhyun’s BF!!!!!!!  
  
**Daddy**  
Fuck yeah  
Remember who brought you together Baekhyun  
You owe me like a lifetime of favours  
  
**Zitaozi**  
There’s nothing wrong with potpourri…  
  
  
Unfortunately, with a foreboding feeling, Baekhyun does remember he owes Jongdae for giving him advice. If it weren’t for Jongdae, he could be having disgusting ménage-a-trios-sex with Sweater Guy, so he owes Jongdae, like, his sanctity of his dick or something. In the midst of his mid-life crisis, he hears a clatter and looks up to see Kyungsoo setting two places down with a tall stack of pancakes and syrup, sitting in the chair opposite. His leg reaches out to shyly brush his foot against Baekhyun’s ankle and whilst it’s very, very welcome, it’s a reminder that Baekhyun is going to have to suffer humiliation at the hands of his friends if he brings Kyungsoo to meet them.  
  
“You look like you’ve just been through three-month constipation and the nearest toilet is on Mars,” Kyungsoo says. “What happened?”  
  
“Nothing really,” Baekhyun says, biting his lip. He dips his fork into the pool of syrup dripping off the highest pancake nervously. “Hey, um, so my friends say they want to meet you. Is that okay? But you don’t have to say yes. In fact, I’d prefer you not to. They’re so embarrassing.”  
  
Kyungsoo pauses with his fork in his mouth, food half-chewed. “Oh,” he says. “Um, a lot of friends? Or just…a small group?”  
  
“There’s, like, five of us? Jongin’s off gallivanting with his 2D anime boys, so I guess we’ll just hang out at the café or something. Zitao works there so he gets an employee discount, but he orders so much shit it doesn’t really make much difference anyway.”  
  
Baekhyun watches as Kyungsoo scrunches up his nose in thought. It really is the cutest thing ever, the way his eyebrows furrow together and his nose wrinkles up. “Okay,” Kyungsoo eventually says. “Okay. I’m up for that.”  
  
Chanyeol replies a little bit too overenthusiastically that it’s bordering shady when Baekhyun messages to tell them they’ll be meeting up later. They’ll be going in the afternoon so they have a few hours to kill first, mooching around the apartment and dragging Kyungsoo into the bedroom so they can makeout on the bed. In the warm blanket of the sun, Baekhyun reaches into the hot tension between them, like a crackling, electrical attraction, and touches Kyungsoo’s nape, dragging him in closer for a kiss. As cheesy as it sounds, Baekhyun can’t get over how soft Kyungsoo’s lips are, and when he tugs off Kyungsoo’s shirt and curls his hand over Kyungsoo’s sternum, how soft the rest of him is, every inch of his body flooded with this feeling that he doesn’t have enough words to describe. Kyungsoo has a soft exterior, which hides an unexpectedly violent personality, which is just a cover-up for the warm-hearted baby he is. Baekhyun mumbles sweetly into Kyungsoo’s ear as they kiss, so different from the way he’s biting Kyungsoo’s mouth, and as soon as he wants to take it a step further, Kyungsoo reminds him that they should probably set off soon, and climbs off the bed to slip his shirt back on and fix his hair. Why does he keep getting cockblocked??? Is the entire world against him today??? What has he done to deserve this? Or perhaps the author is just too lazy to add a sex scene??? These are the real questions in life.  
  
They arrive five minutes before the designated meet-up time; Baekhyun had hoped to arrive before the others so he could mentally prepare himself, but everyone’s already there, sitting at their usual table. Jongdae spots him first through the window and waves, wildly gesticulating for them to come in, and the smirk on his face gives Baekhyun a horrible feeling about this. A horrible, horrible feeling, and his hunches are usually correct. He’d had a hunch that Kyungsoo was cute, and he is; he’d had a hunch that Jongin, on the first day they’d met, was a massive nerd, and he was more than right. Today, he has a hunch that he’s going to be made fun of, badly.  
  
“I just want to tell you before we go in,” Baekhyun says, clasping Kyungsoo’s shoulders, “that you shouldn’t believe anything they tell you. If they tell you weird stuff about it, it’s not true. Like, um, Zitao might say something about jar porn. I have never watched that. I don’t even know what porn is. So, yeah.”  
  
“I think I’ll be okay,” says Kyungsoo, grinning slightly, and just because Kyungsoo’s smile makes him feel brave, he leans forward and kisses Kyungsoo on the mouth, locking their fingers together as they walk into the café to the sound of Jongdae’s wolf-whistles and Chanyeol’s whooping.  
  
“Okay, this is Kyungsoo,” says Baekhyun, protectively holding Kyungsoo next to him by the waist. “He is my boyfriend. Annoying Friends, meet Kyungsoo. Kyungsoo, meet Annoying Friends: Chanyeol”—Chanyeol waves, left eye twitching from excitement—“Zitao”—at least Zitao is more subtle about it and offers a normal smile—“and the spawn of Satan, Jongdae”—Jongdae beams at Kyungsoo and oh, that means nothing good at all. “You’ve met him now. Hi. Bye. Let’s go, Soo.”  
  
Baekhyun tugs on Kyungsoo’s arm and makes to leave, but Jongdae tuts and shakes his head. Baekhyun sighs.  
  
“Wow, so rude,” Chanyeol says. “You have no manners, Baekhyun. Sit down for a little bit. Let’s talk.”  
  
And by that, he means, _Let’s find as many ways as possible to humiliate Baekhyun for the rest of his life by telling embarrassing stories about him,_ and Baekhyun isn’t about that shit, but Kyungsoo is staring at him wide-eyed so Baekhyun heaves another sigh and drags two chairs over from an empty neighbouring table, perching himself between Kyungsoo and Chanyeol. He makes sure Kyungsoo is sitting next to Zitao, who will probably cause the least collateral damage. He hopes.  
  
“So, Kyungsoo,” Chanyeol says, lowering his voice conspiratorially, “has Baekhyun told you about his collection of glass dil—“  
  
“OH MY GOD,” Baekhyun shrieks, shoving his hand over Chanyeol’s mouth. “Shut up right now or I swear to god this fist is going straight up your ass—“  
  
Silence.  
  
Kyungsoo looks at him with no discernible expression on his face. Perhaps talking about shoving his fist up his friend’s ass is not the best conversation starter. Baekhyun inhales deeply to become, once again, a swaying cherry blossom tree in the cool breeze, and removes his hand from Chanyeol’s herpes-ridden mouth, sitting back down and wiping his palm on his jeans.  
  
“We use kinky gay sex to playfully tease each other,” Baekhyun says lamely. “Haha. Right, Chanyeol?”  
  
He slaps Chanyeol on the back, making sure to hit as hard as he can. “Sure,” Chanyeol wheezes.  
  
More awkward silence. Zitao pushes back his cuticles. Chanyeol stares intensely at Kyungsoo. Kyungsoo looks at Baekhyun for help, but Baekhyun doesn’t think he’s in any position to help anyone right now. Jongdae rolls his eyes.  
  
“Pathetic, all of you,” he says. “Come on, Kyungsoo. Baekhyun hasn’t even bought you a drink, right? Let’s get one together and I can tell you all about Baekhyun’s tiny dick, okay?”  
  
“MY DICK IS A RECTAL DESTROYER,” Baekhyun says, and Kyungsoo, having stood up to follow Jongdae, looks at him again. Baekhyun notices they’re still holding hands, and evidently, so does Chanyeol as he smiles smugly. Baekhyun shrinks in his seat. He’s become so embarrassing in, like, ten minutes. He swears he wasn’t this embarrassing back at home. Damn his inner need to impress his friends. “I mean, have fun. Come back safely.”  
  
“I’ll try not to trip over a coffee grain and die,” Kyungsoo says, giving Baekhyun’s hand one last squeeze.  
  
Forlornly, Baekhyun watches at Jongdae leads Kyungsoo away to the counter, pointing out the good drinks on the menu but probably actually telling Kyungsoo all about his sex habits. They’re not weird sex habits. They’re just unconventional. Baekhyun enjoys exploring his sexuality, but he realises that Kyungsoo probably isn’t into spanking him until he cries and lets out a distressed groan. Burying his face in his hands, he kicks his feet under the table and hopes it catches Chanyeol’s stupidly long legs. Everything is going so wrong. This is all Jongin’s fault. Dammit, Jongin.  
  
“I fucked up,” Baekhyun says sadly, watching over his arms as Jongdae says something to Kyungsoo and Kyungsoo laughs. DAMMIT. Jongdae is a smooth-talker and whilst Baekhyun normally exudes sexual confidence, he thinks Jongdae might even be able to steal Kyungsoo from right under his nose without him realising. “I fucked up, so badly.”  
  
“Not the worst first meeting I’ve ever had,” Zitao says. “Remember when you initiated me into the group? Chanyeol cried for, like, two days afterwards. It was hot.”  
  
“Disgusting,” says Baekhyun.  
  
“Okay, I take that back: you did fuck it up. Big time,” says Zitao.  
  
“Hell yeah you did,” says Chanyeol. This is totally unacceptable, thinks Baekhyun. They are not allowed to make fun of him! He is supposed to mock Chanyeol’s stupidity and Zitao’s nasty kinky fetishes, not the other way around! “How long was that?”  
  
“Three minutes and twenty-seven seconds...damn,” Zitao says. He passes a few dollar bills across the table, which Chanyeol stuffs into his pocket triumphantly, and Baekhyun gapes at both of them.  
  
“You’re having a bet to see how long it’d take me to mess up? You guys are _evil._ ”  
  
“Don’t pretend you didn’t do it for me,” Chanyeol says. “Anyway, Zitao bet four minutes. I bet less than four. You’re impressive, Byun Baekhyun. That must be a new record. With style, too, talking about platonic fisting.”  
  
“Arhghghblarghughlarhghgh,” says Baekhyun miserably. “At least he’s with Jongdae. I kind of trust Jongdae. Like, a tiny fraction more than I trust you guys. He can be a surprisingly decent human being sometimes.”  
  
“Really,” says Chanyeol disbelievingly. “REALLY. REALLY? Kim Jongdae, the guy you went out with for the entirety of forty minutes, in which he, a) told everyone and their aunt really graphic details of your dick, and b) told everyone and their aunt about your crusty erotic—“  
  
“OKAY, I get it,” says Baekhyun. He doesn’t want to be reminded of that traumatic experience, or what’d happened twenty minutes prior, when he and Jongdae had actually tried the relationship thing, only to find that Nope. Just Nope. It’s both too embarrassing and horrifying to recall. He doesn’t want to talk about it ever again. “Ugh.”  
  
He only raises his head from the table when Jongdae and Kyungsoo return, chatting amiably. Kyungsoo doesn’t seem to be mentally traumatised (yet), smiling as he holds his coffee cup in his hand, which calms Baekhyun’s nerves slightly, but Jongdae grins at him in a way that absolutely throws everything he’s just thought out the window and sends alarm bells ringing in his head. He has no doubt that what Jongdae has told Kyungsoo is bad. Very, very bad. They should probably get out of here now. Right now. Whilst there’s still time to save themselves.  
  
“Okay, that’s enough socialising, I think,” he says, standing up just as Kyungsoo’s about to sit back down. “Kyungsoo, should we go? There’s something I want to show you today.” There’s nothing; they’ve already been to the coffee shop and exhausted all of the city’s viable leisure facilities because there is literally nothing else to do than drink coffee in the entire world. Apparently.  
  
“Oh,” says Kyungsoo. Baekhyun offers his hand, and when a moment of deliberation passes, he takes it, warm from the coffee cup, and follows Baekhyun as he speed-walks of the café, so fast that he’s worthy of competing in the Olympics. He calls behind him, as Jongdae, Chanyeol and Zitao wave, “It was nice meeting you! See you—“  
  
The door slams shut. Baekhyun leads him far enough until he doesn’t feel hives breaking out all over his body from Jongdae’s satanic qi and looks him square in the eye as he says, very seriously, “What did Jongdae tell you? Don’t believe a single thing. Whatever he said to you, he was lying. It’s not true! Unless it was something about how cool and sexy and amazing I am, but I doubt he’s even able to say anything nice about anyone else.”  
  
“What even,” says Kyungsoo flatly. “He just talked to me about. Stuff. He’s nice. Don’t worry about it. It’s no big”—okay, Baekhyun swears that Kyungsoo’s eyes just flicked down to his dick—“deal. Really.”  
  
“Goddammit Jongdae,” Baekhyun mutters angrily.  
  
“Oh, by the way, he told me you guys used to date or something? I didn’t know that.”  
  
“ _Goddammit_ Jongdae!!!!!” Baekhyun says. He stares at the floor, and then back up at Kyungsoo as earnestly as he can, but Kyungsoo just looks mostly amused more than anything, which is reassuring. He thinks. “Um, not date. We just. Kind of fooled around a bit? Maybe? But that’s over now. OVER. I would never stick my hand up his butt. Ever again. Really. I’ll break up with him. Friend-divorce.”  
  
“That’s not necessary,” Kyungsoo says, covering his laugh with the back of his hand, and oh god, he’s so cute. Is it physically possible for someone to be this cute? Baekhyun does not know but he thinks he’s finding out now. “I was just wondering. Anyway, I was kind of surprised to see Jongdae here. I remembered you mentioned him before but I wasn’t entirely sure if it was the same guy.”  
  
Baekhyun gapes at him. “You know Jongdae?”  
  
“Know _of_ him,” Kyungsoo corrects. “I have a friend who’s an underwear model too. They know each other.”  
  
“Oh right—wait. What do you mean, ‘too’!?”  
  
“Um, adverb. Means ‘likewise’?”  
  
Baekhyun looks at him.  
  
“Okay, so you’re telling me you don’t know what he does for a living. And you’ve known him for, like, three years or something. Wow.”  
  
“All I know is that he’s an annoying, asthmatic fucker who needs to shove a fucking knife up his asshole. He’s Satan. Plus, when I ask, all he does is laugh evilly and tap the side of his nose!”  
  
“Baekhyun,” says Kyungsoo, “he’s a Victoria’s Secret model.”  
  
Oh.  
  
Enlightening.  
  
And slightly disturbing.  
  
“Isn’t that the shop that sells…women’s lingerie?”  
  
“…Yeah,” Kyungsoo replies. “Don’t think too hard about it.” He frowns, and then that frown turns into a grin and he tips his head to the side adorably. Baekhyun’s heart tap-dances happily in his chest and suddenly, everything is okay. “So, anyway, you said you had something to show me? Why don’t you, then?”  
  
Baekhyun doesn’t; that was just a poorly-constructed excuse to abandon his friends, so he leads Kyungsoo around this part of the city until he finds somewhere that looks kind of decent where there aren’t any of his annoying friends to make fun of him. It’s the arcade, the place they used to hang out at a lot before Life Happened, and he’s friendly with most of the employees since Chanyeol part-times here, so he pulls Kyungsoo in and feels nostalgia rushing through his body at the gaming machines and the Donkey Kong machine where his high score still flashes on the screen. It’s only small, but there’s air conditioning and it isn’t too busy, and seeing the delight on Kyungsoo’s face, he knows he’s made the right choice.  
  
“Oh my god,” Kyungsoo breathes out, dragging Baekhyun over to something that’s piqued his interest. He’s staring at a claw machine in rapt attention, tiny figures lined up on the shelf inside. “Is that—oh my god. It is. It’s the special, limited edition Echizen Ryoma figurine, only sold in three countries with manoeuvrable arms and legs!”  
  
“You want it?” Baekhyun asks, and straight away, Kyungsoo shakes his head, blushing.  
  
“No! No, I don’t, I was just looking,” he says. “I—Baekhyun, no, what are you doing?”  
  
Rolling his sleeves up, Baekhyun pushes a coin into the slot, scrunching his eyebrows up in concentration as he starts his first attempt to grab the sacred, prized Ryoma figurine. He doesn’t care much for the sentimental value of collectibles, but he’s screwed up so much today that he wants to make things right. With his tongue peeking out and focusing like a cherry blossom tree, he carefully moves the claw until it’s situated right above the box of the toy and waits as it descends down, the metal arms wrapping around the box. It’s grabbed the toy. He watches, holding his breath, and then exhales disappointedly when it slips from the claw’s grasp. Fucking shitty metal. He sighs. Tries again.  
  
“What are you doing, Baekhyun,” says Kyungsoo. “I—let’s go. It’s stupid. I didn’t want it anyway. I was just looking. You’re awful, anyway.”  
  
“Excuse me,” says Baekhyun, starting up his second attempt as the claw moves across. Drops. “Fuck. Anyway, I’m the best at these claw machine games. Like, seriously. I am the king. Do you know what they call me back at home?”  
  
“Something like a really bad pun involving your name and the word ‘claw’ that’s likely to make me punch you?”  
  
“They call me…” Baekhyun pauses, for dramatic effect, only to be ruined by his wince as the box drops for the third time, “Baekhyun.”  
  
Kyungsoo punches him anyway. “You’re an idiot.”  
  
“I just want to get this for someone I like,” says Baekhyun, turning back to the machine. His fourth and fifth attempts don’t manage to go any better. He really sucks at this. He makes a sound of frustration, but he isn’t going to give up. If there’s one thing he’s going to do right today, it’s going to be getting this crappy toy to give to Kyungsoo. “Someone I really like.”  
  
He fails the sixth try. And the seventh. And the eighth. And the ninth. And on the tenth, it’s starting to get a little bit ridiculous (and embarrassing), but he wants to get it so badly. By now, more people are coming in, and the arcade is beginning to fill up with customers, but no one else is queuing for the claw machine so Baekhyun takes that as a signal to start his eleventh attempt. And fucks it up. Twelfth attempt. Thirteenth. Fourteenth. All the while, Kyungsoo is watching him silently, something unreadable in his eyes, and Baekhyun wants to get this. He can’t fail in front of Kyungsoo. He is a man. A real man. He must persevere. Fifteenth. Sixteenth. Seventeenth.  
  
On the eighteenth, Kyungsoo tugs at his sleeve. “Um, it’s getting kind of busy,” he says. “Maybe we should go.”  
  
Baekhyun’s too preoccupied trying to make the stupid claw hold onto the dumb box, mashing the buttons frantically. He grumbles dejectedly when it drops back into the pile, tumbling with a clatter, and digs into his pocket for another coin. It goes into the slot with a clink and he starts up the game again, replying, “Uh, yeah, just a sec. Lemme just get this—“  
  
“There’s a lot of people,” Kyungsoo says again, and this time there’s a forced casualness to it, an edge which Baekhyun notices. It makes him stop and turn to Kyungsoo, who’s glancing around furtively. The box, barely in his grasp, falls back down. There’s guilt in Kyungsoo’s eyes, mixed in with something else, and Baekhyun is generally known for being an ass, but he has enough sense to see that, for some reason, something isn’t quite right. “I think we should go…”  
  
“S’all right,” Baekhyun says, offering him a reassuring smile and holding out his hand. Kyungsoo gives him a hesitant smile back and threads their fingers together.  
  
Slowly, Baekhyun is discovering, every moment, new things about Kyungsoo. The way he’s shy and awkward, the way he tries to cover it up with brash words and overly descriptive death threats, the way he doesn’t initiate, but always accepts. The way he kisses back is sweet and soft and Baekhyun finds that he loves it; and then, sometimes, he’ll bite, suck on Baekhyun’s upper lip and the lower, reciprocating with just as much fierceness as Baekhyun gives him, and Baekhyun loves that too. He thinks he knows a lot about Kyungsoo already: his hobby of reading bad tennis smut, his pretty damn good cooking, and his small collection of bottle caps; and at the same time, he realises that maybe he knows nothing at all. Finding out about the new things is part of the adventure.  
  
It’s tipping into night-time when Baekhyun returns from his bath, drying his hair with a towel, and Kyungsoo is sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at his hands. After their date, they’d gone home and Baekhyun had tried to cook food whilst Kyungsoo had showered, and Baekhyun had been more than thankful when Kyungsoo had graciously ignored the takeout menu in the trash can and the smell of smoke wafting from the kitchen. So maybe today hadn’t been perfect, but what Baekhyun likes about this is that they have all the time in the world to make things right. To make things better. A little blip in the million days they have together doesn’t mean anything; Baekhyun feels this starvation, this hunger, in his heart for Kyungsoo, and it’s this feeling that pulls him towards Kyungsoo, settling on the bed next to him. Kyungsoo looks at him with a half-grin, and Baekhyun presses his own to Kyungsoo’s mouth, droplets of water dripping from his hair onto his knees. His hand curls into a fist on Kyungsoo’s lap, and he’s so consumed, so overwhelmed by the thrumming in his chest.  
  
“Hey—um,” Kyungsoo says when he moves back, tongue wetting his lips, “sorry about today. I—“  
  
“Hm?” says Baekhyun. “Oh. It’s all right. Don’t worry about it.”  
  
“I feel like I just…fucked things up,” says Kyungsoo, and the instinct to protect Kyungsoo, because he’s vulnerable and needs Baekhyun in a way that Baekhyun needs him, washes over Baekhyun.  
  
it’s earnest, painfully so, because he wants to make Kyungsoo understand: “No, you haven’t. Really. It’s okay.”  
  
Kyungsoo stares at him. “No, I—I always do this. Ruin everything. I’m too _me_ , I think. I wish I were more like you, sometimes. More extroverted. More outgoing. When things become like this, I always…run away…”  
  
They’re a lot more like each other than Kyungsoo knows, Baekhyun thinks.  
  
“You know, I was really surprised when you started talking to me. Even if it didn’t seem like it. I’m not exactly the best at expressing my feelings. But I was surprised because I’m just a nobody and you’re really a somebody. It was kind of unexpected. I’m not good at this kind of stuff.”  
  
“Is that why today…?”  
  
Kyungsoo smiles, but it’s tinged with sadness, and suddenly, Baekhyun recognises the earlier look in Kyungsoo’s eyes. His heart clenches.  
  
“Yeah,” Kyungsoo says. “You figured it out, huh? Before, I…uploaded videos, like you did.” Everything Baekhyun has ever wanted is right next to him, so he reaches for Kyungsoo’s hand and tells him it’s all right with the words he can’t say. “I got headhunted by a big entertainment company. They liked my face and they liked my voice, so they contacted me and asked if I wanted to make it big. But I was stupid back then, I think. I was still a teenager and the thought of being famous was exciting. I mean, it’s not hard to imagine, when you’re sixteen and you have all these big dreams, that being a celebrity would be appealing, because it was. So much.  
  
But it wasn’t—I don’t think it was a good thing. I don’t know. I just. Felt kind of depressed for a really long time. I felt purposeless. Like for the first time in my life, I wasn’t sure if singing was something I really wanted to do. What was I doing it for? It felt like something that I was forced to do, not because I wanted to, but because I had to. And I was so scared. So lonely. I didn’t have anyone. And outside, I kept thinking, what if they recognised me? Silly things, like, what if they were going to stab me and sell my kidney on the black market? Stupid, right? Sometimes, though, I wonder if I’ve made the right decision. Wonder if I weren’t such a coward, if I’d had stayed, where would I be now? I was even scared to come here. Pathetic, isn’t it?”  
  
“No, I don’t think it is,” says Baekhyun, firmly. “I know you’re not pathetic. It’s okay to be scared—and you overcame that fear. I think that’s brave in its own right, don’t you? I think you shouldn’t change. You’re so awkward and pushy…” Baekhyun’s voice quietens to a softness, and he continues, “but you’re so kind and wonderful and I think you’re fine, just the way you are. I like you, just the way you are.”  
  
Perfect, Baekhyun almost says, but Kyungsoo isn’t. He’s far from is, but they both are, and maybe—no, definitely, that’s what Baekhyun likes about him. Baekhyun doesn’t want perfect. He wants Kyungsoo. No matter how many times he says it, it’ll always be true.  
  
Kyungsoo is so many things to him, and at the same time, he is just…the one. The one that Baekhyun wants. And he shines so brightly even in the darkness of the room, Baekhyun thinks, hours later as he listens to Kyungsoo’s gentle breathing in the night, that he doesn’t know why it’s so hard for Kyungsoo to understand.  
  
  


 

**♪ ♫ ♪**

  
  
  
  
****Take Care of You – Giriboy (baekhyunee_gg)**  
[301 views]  
Published 1 hour ago  
[baekhyunee_gg]**  
  
  


 

**♪ ♫ ♪**

  
  
  
  
“I have something to give you!”  
  
Kyungsoo is standing by the bed, folding his socks neatly into perfect squares with a contraption that looks like a sock-folding machine before stacking them into tidy piles in his bag, when Baekhyun sneaks in, not particularly inconspicuously at all. He’s hiding something behind his back, almost skipping towards Kyungsoo as he whips it out, with sound effects and everything, because this definitely deserves sound effects.  
  
“Ta-dah!” he sing-songs, pushing the gift into Kyungsoo’s open hands. It’s a box wrapped up in Christmas paper because he’s too cheap to buy anything else, but it’s the sentiment behind it that really counts.  
  
“What’s this even for?” Kyungsoo asks. He turns the box in his hands and shakes it, startled when he hears something rattling inside.  
  
“Well, you’re leaving in a few days so I thought I’d get you a present. It’s just something small,” says Baekhyun. He grins excitedly and motions at the box. “Open it, open it, open it!”  
  
When Kyungsoo does, the first thing he does is stare. The second is let out the unmanliest squeak Baekhyun’s ever heard. The third thing: he gapes at Baekhyun and opens his mouth, only to find he doesn’t know what to say. It’s so adorable that Baekhyun can barely hold himself back from smooshing Kyungsoo’s cheeks together—the only reason he can is because he knows Kyungsoo will punch him if he does that and Kyungsoo’s punches, for such a small person, hurt.  
  
“So I’m guessing you like it?”  
  
Kyungsoo turns the box in his hands, Ryoma’s face smiling up at him as he poses in his Seigaku uniform with a racket in his left hand. “It’s amazing,” he says, sort of in awe, and then hastily, he adds, “not that I like this kind of stuff or anything. Whatever. It’s nice. Whatever. Shut up. How’d you get this anyway? You suck at claw machines.”  
  
“I am the best at claw machines,” says Baekhyun defensively.  
  
Kyungsoo raises an eyebrow.  
  
“Okay, maybe I kind of got Chanyeol to get it out of the machine for me with his massive monkey arms, but whatever,” Baekhyun says. “So, you—“  
  
He doesn’t manage to finish his sentence because Kyungsoo is pushing him back till he tumbles onto the bed, not before placing the box delicately into his bag. Breathlessly, as he reaches up to wrap his arms around Kyungsoo’s shoulders, Baekhyun asks, “What are—what are you doing?”  
  
“Giving you _your_ gift,” says Kyungsoo, and there’s a glint in his eye, something that Baekhyun hasn’t seen in Kyungsoo’s shy and awkward demeanour.  
  
As Kyungsoo leans down to kiss him, Baekhyun decides that, oh, he likes this glint, very, very much.  
  
  


 

**♪ ♫ ♪**

  
  
  
  
**Beautiful – original composition (baekhyunee_gg)**  
[301 views]  
Published 10 minutes ago  
[baekhyunee_gg]  
  
Special thanks to my ROOMMATE Chanyeol for helping me produce this song! I wrote this song for the person who is extremely really very special to me. Was I able to express my emotions fully in the song? I guess there are other ways I can show it though…heheh. ಠ◡ಠ  
  
Let’s trend it:[#baekdeliciousmountainstormxXxIsReal](http://www.livejournal.com/rsearch/?tags=%23baekdeliciousmountainstormxXxIsReal)!!!!!!!  
  
(I love you!!!!)


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